' ■' i W i r< ■' ■■ ■ - \ i 
u;; : ': : "i :o 
Bii . ! i . •■ •. 

\ ■' I ... : : ■ U 1 OX ' 

Mar f iMp :. ... • 
O pie 



■ 1 t* 




























■ ■ '■■ 


. ■ 






■ . 


. 























LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

?S ^^ — — 

Chap,. , Copyright No 

.ffe 



i 



Shell..LL_^_.. 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



AUTHORS' READINGS 



AUTHORS' READINGS 



Compiled and illustrated throughout 
with pen and ink drawings 



0.1*^ 




RECITATIONS FROM THEIR OWN WORKS 

BY 

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY BILL NYE 

MARY HARTWELL CATHERVVOOD EUGENE FIELD 

ELLA WHEELER WILCOX WILL CARLETON 

HAMLIN GARLAND M QUAD 
AND OPIE READ 

With a biography of each author 



NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 









Copyright, 1897, by 
ARTHUR H. YOUNG. 



Ail rights reserved. 



o 



ILLUSTRATOR'S NOTE. 

To the person now holding this book , 




The sketches in this volume showing 
characteristic attitudes of the authors rep- 
resented are the illustrator's individual im- 
pressions from life. They were made by 
him from pencil sketches drawn while ob- 
serving the authors read or recite, or from 
his recollection of the various poses assumed. 
Some of the original sketches in lead pencil 
were made at public readings. Others were 
made in private. 

With sixteen well-known American writers 
this plan has been pursued. They are the 



IV ILLUSTRATOR S NOTE, 

following : — General Lew Wallace, James 
Whitcomb Riley, Captain Charles King, 
Joaquin Miller, Octave Thanet, C. B. Lewis, 
(" M. Quad "), Edgar Wilson Nye, Eugene 
Field, Ella Wheeler Wilcox, John Vance 
Cheney, Lillian Bell, Mary Hartwell Cath- 
erwood, Opie Read, Will Carleton, Hamlin 
Garland anr 1 Robert Burdette. 

In addition to the many characteristic 
poses, a large portrait sketch from life, 
signed by each author, was made. When 
the question of putting these pictorial ob- 
servations into book form arose it was found 
that there was ample material for two books. 
Under these circumstances those authors 
were chosen for the present work whose at- 
titudes were entirely completed and whose 
literary work had already been selected and 
illustrated. 

The nine authors represented in this 
book have not ever appeared together in 
one entertainment prior to the one which is 
now offered to the reader by this volume 
itself. 

Moreover, some of them have never (be- 
fore) appeared in public readings, while 



ILLUSTRATOR S NOTE. V 

others were associated together on the plat- 
form for many years. 

The late Eugene Field and Edgar Wilson 
Nye gave the illustrator much encourage- 
ment and left him greatly indebted to them. 

Toward the other authors he feels under 
great obligation for much courtesy, while to 
the various publishers controlling the works 
of the different authors, grateful acknowl- 
edgment is made. Full credit is given in 
each case in the biographical part of this 
work. 



m©E 







Frontispiece 

We cross the pasture, and through 
% the wood .... 

Then, let us, one and all, be contented 

with our lot ... 

He trudged away up the road in a 

pleasant glow of hope . 
A lazy June day .... 
I knew the wood — the very tree — where 

lived the poaching, saucy crow 
I woke up in the dark ari saw things 

standin' in a row 
A backwoods Sunday .... 

The meet ...... 

Under the soporific influences of an un- 
derpaid preacher .... 

He was asleep ..... 



Page • 

7v 



2 9 

37 
49' 

55 

97 

iog 

117 

120 



Vlll FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS 

Page 

Drawing of Eugene Field . . . 141 
Drawing of Will Carleton . . . iji 
Drawing of Mary Hartweli Cather- 

wood ...... 757? 

Drawing of James Whitcomb Riley . 165 
Drawing of Opie Pope Read . . jyy 
Drawing of Ella Wheeler Wilcox . i8j 
Drawing of C. B. Lewis . . . 191 
Drawing of Bill Nye .... ipp 

Drawing of Hamlin Garland . . 2 op 



PROGRAM 

Page 

Thoughts fer the Discuraged Farmer . j 
Old Aunt Mary' s p 

A Life Lesson . . . . ij 

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 

Uncle Ethan Ripley . . . . 1/ 
HAMLIN GARLAND 



Long Ago ..... 


• 47 


Little Boy Blue .... 


• 51 


Seein' Things .... 


• 53 


EUGENE FIELD 





The Little Renault .... jp 
MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD 

The Last of His Race . . ?z 

The Boys Around the House . . 77 

" M. QUAD " 



X PROGRAM 




Which are you ? 

Solitude ..... 

The Beautiful Land of Nod ■ 


Page 

• 83 

• 8 5 

• 8 7 


ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 




A Backwoods Sunday 


• 9 1 


OP1E READ 




How to Hunt the Fox 
A Blasted Snore 


■ 103 
. 115 


BILL NYE J . 




The Christmas Baby . 

The Lightning-rod Dispenser 


• 125 
. 129 



WILL CARLETON 



BIOGRAPHIES 



Eugene Field . 


Page 
■ 143 


Page 
Opie Read . . . 1J9 


Will Carleton . 


• 153 


Ella Wheeler Wil- 


Miry Hart-well 






Catherwood . 


. 161 


C. B. Lewis . . igj 


fames Whitcomb 




Bill Nye .... 201 



Riley .... 167 \ Hamlin Garland . 211 



JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 




" You can hear the blackbirds jawin' as they f oiler tip the ploiv — 
Oh, theyr bound to git theyr brekfast, and theyr not a-carin how.'" 




James Whitcomb Riley reciting " Thoughts fer the 
Discurasred Fa> mer." 



THOUGHTS FER THE DISCURAGED 
FARMER 

BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 

The summer wind is sniffin' 'round the 

bloomin' locus' trees ; 
And the clover in the pastur' is a big day 

fer the bees, 
And they been a-swiggin honey, above 

board and on the sly, 
Tel they stutter in theyr buzzin' and stag- 
ger as they fly. 
The flicker on the fence-rail 'pears to jest 

spit on his wings 
And roll up his feathers, by the sassy way 

he sings ; 
And the hoss-fly is a-whettin'-up his forelegs 

fer biz, 
And the off-mare is a-switchin' all of her 

tale they is. 




The summer wind is 
sniffirf , " 



4 



authors' readings 




u *, ■% :a »• ' 



You can hear the blackbirds jawin' as they 

foller up the plow — 
Oh, theyr bound to git theyr brekfast, and 

theyr not a-carin' how ; 
So they quarrel in the furries, and they 

quarrel on the wing — 
But theyr peaceabler in pot-pies than any 

other thing ; 
And it's when I git my shot-gun drawed up 

in stiddy rest, 
She's as full of tribbelation as a yeller- 

jacket's nest; 
And a few shots before dinner, when the 

sun's a-shinin' right, 
Seems to kindo-sorto sharpen up a feller's 

appetite ! 



They's been a heap o' rain, but the sun's 

out to-day, 
And the clouds of the wet spell is all 

cleared away, 
And the woods is all the greener, and the 

grass is greener still ; 
It may rain again to-morry, but I don't 

think it will. 



THOUGHTS FER THE DISCURAGED FARMER 5 



Some says the crops is ruined, and the 

corn's drownded out, 
And propha-sy the wheat will be a failure, 

without doubt ; 
But the kind Providence that has never 

failed us yet, 
Will be on hands onc't more at the 'leventh 

hour, I bet ! 



Does the medder-lark complane, as he swims 

high and dry 
Through the waves of the wind and the blue 

of the sky ? 
Does the quail set up and whissel in a dissa- 

pinted way, 
Er hang his head in silunce, and sorrow all 

the day? 
Is the chipmunck's health a-failin' ? Does 

he walk er does he run ? 
Don't the buzzards ooze around up thare 

jest like they've alius done? 
Is they anything the matter with the roost- 
er's lungs er voice — 
Ort a mortal be complainin' when dumb 

animals rejoice? 




"Er hang his head in 
silunce." 



6 AUTHORS READINGS 

Then, let us, one and all, be contented with 

our lot ; 
The June is here this morning, and the sun 

is shining hot. 
Oh ! let us fill our hearts up with the glory 

of the day, 
And banish ev'ry doubt and care and sorrow 

fur away ! 
Whatever be our station, with Providence 

fer guide, 
Sich fine circumstances ort to make us satis- 
fied; 
Fer the world is full of roses, and the roses 

full of dew, 
And the dew is full of heavenly love that 

drips fer me and you. 





"We cross the pasture, and through the wood." 




■ Then, let us, one and all, be contented with our lot. 



OLD AUNT MARY'S 

BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 

Wasn't it pleasant, brother mine, 
In those old days of the lost sunshine 
Of youth — when the Saturday's chores were 

through, 
And the " Sunday's wood " in the kitchen, 

too, 
And we went visiting, " me and you," 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's ? 

It all comes back so clear to-day ! 
Though I am as bald as you are gray — 
Out by the barn-lot, and down the lane, 
We patter along in the dust again, 
As light as the tips of the drops of the rain, 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 




1 Me and you. 



We cross the pasture, and through the wood 
Where the old gray snag of the poplar stood, 



IO 



AUTHORS READINGS 



Where the hammering " red-heads " hopped 
awry, 

And the buzzard "raised" in the "clear- 
ing" sky, 

And lolled and circled, as we went by 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 

And then in the dust of the road again ; 
And the teams we met, and the countrymen ; 
And the long highway, with sunshine spread 
As thick as butter on country bread, 
Our cares behind, and our hearts ahead 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 

Why, I see her now in the open door, 
Where the little gourds grew up the sides, 

and o'er 
The clapboard roof ! — And her face — ah, 

me ! 
Wasn't it good for a boy to see — 
And wasn't it good for a boy to be 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 




And O my brother, so far away, 
This is to tell you she waits to-day 









OLD AUNT MARYS 



II 



To welcome us — Aunt Mary fell 
Asleep this morning, whispering, " Tell 
The boys to come ! ' ' And all is well 
Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 








JMIUP' Kj///^ 



A LIFE-LESSON 

BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 

There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 

They have broken your doll, I know ; 
And your tea-set blue, 
And your play-house, too, 
Are things of the long ago ; 

But childish troubles will soon pass by 
There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 

There ! little girl; don't cry ! 

They have broken your slate, I know ; 
And the glad, wild ways 
Of your school-girl days 
Are things of the long ago ; 

But life and love will soon come by. 
There! little girl; don't cry! 

There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 

They have broken your heart, I know J 
And the rainbow gleams 
Of your youthful dreams 




14 



authors' readings 



Are things of the long ago ; 

But heaven holds all for which you 
sigh. 
There ! little girl; don't cry ! 










HAMLIN GARLAND 




The tired ponies slept in the shade of the lombardies. 




/ will read "Uncle Ethan Ripley," the story of a 
kindly old farmer who was imposed upon by a patent 
medicine man. 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 

BY HAMLIN GARLAND 

Uncle Ethan had a theory that a man's 
character could be told by the way he sat in 
a wagon-seat. 

"A mean man sets right plumb in the 
middle o' the seat, as much as to say, 
' Walk, gol darn yeh, who cares ? ' But a 
man that sets in one corner o' the seat, 
much as to say, ' Jump in — cheaper t' ride 
'n to walk,' you can jest tie to." 

Uncle Ripley was prejudiced in favor of 
the stranger, therefore, before he came op- 
posite the potato patch, where the old man 
was " bugging his vines." The stranger 
drove a jaded-looking pair of calico ponies, 
hitched to a clattering democrat wagon, and 
he sat on the extreme end of the seat, with 
the lines in his right hand, while his left 
rested on his thigh, with his little finger 




' ' y-ump in- 



AUTHORS READINGS 




gracefully crooked and his elbows akimbo. 
He wore a blue shirt, with gay-colored arm- 
lets just above the elbows, and his vest hung 
unbuttoned down his lank ribs. It was plain 
he was well pleased with himself. 

As he pulled up and threw one leg over 
the end of the seat, Uncle Ethan observed 
that the left spring was much more worn 
than the other, which proved that it was not 
accidental, but that it was the driver's habit 
to sit on that end of the seat. 

" Good -afternoon," said the stranger, 
pleasantly. 

" Good-afternoon, sir." 

" Bugs purty plenty ? " 

" Plenty enough, I gol ! I don't see 
where they all come fum." 

"Early Rose?" inquired the man, as if 
referring to the bugs. 

"No; Peachblows an' Carter Reds. My 
Early Rose is over near the house. The old 
woman wants 'em near. See the darned 
things ! " he pursued, rapping savagely on 
the edge of the pan to rattle the bugs back. 

" How do yeli kill 'em — scald 'em?" 

"Mostly. Sometimes I " 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



19 



"Good piece of oats," yawned the 
stranger, listlessly. 

"That's barley." 

" So 'tis. Didn't notice." 

Uncle Ethan was wondering what the 
man was. He had some pots of black paint 
in the wagon, and two or three square 
boxes. 

" What do yeh think o' Cleveland's 
chances for a third term?" continued the 
man, as if they had been talking politics all 
the while. 

Uncle Ripley scratched his head. 
" Waal — I dunno — bein' a Republican — I 
think " 

"That's so — it's a purty scaly outlook — 
I don't believe in third terms myself," the 
man hastened to say. 

' ' Is that your new barn acrost there ? ' ' 
pointing with his whip. 

"Yes, sir, it is," replied the old man, 
proudly. After years of planning and hard 
work he had managed to erect a little wooden 
barn, costing possibly three hundred dollars. 
It was plain to be seen he took a childish 
pride in the fact of its newness. 




1 Is that your new 
barn — " 



authors' readings 




The stranger mused. "A lovely place 
for a sign," he said, as his eyes wandered 
across its shining yellow broadside. 

Uncle Ethan stared, unmindful of the 
bugs crawling over the edge of his pan. His 
interest in the pots of paint deepened. 

"Couldn't think o' lettin' me paint a 
sign on that barn? " the stranger continued, 
putting his locked hands around one knee, 
and gazing away across the pig-pen at the 
building. 

' ' What kind of a sign ? Gol darn your 
skins ! ' ' Uncle Ethan pounded the pan 
with his paddle and scraped two or three 
crawling abominations off his leathery wrist. 

It was a beautiful day, and the man in the 
wagon seemed unusually loath to attend to 
business. The tired ponies slept in the shade 
of the lombardies. The plain was draped in 
a warm mist, and shadowed by vast, vaguely 
defined masses of clouds — a lazy June day. 

" Dodd's Family Bitters," said the man, 
waking out of his abstraction with a start, 
and resuming his working manner. " The 
best bitter in the market." He alluded to 
it in the singular. ' ' Like to look at it ? 




UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



21 



No trouble to show goods, as the fellah says," 
he went on hastily, seeing Uncle Ethan's 
hesitation. 

He produced a large bottle of triangular 
shape, like a bottle for pickled onions. It 
had a red seal on top, and a strenuous cau- 
tion in red letters on the neck, " None genu- 
ine unless ' Dodd's Family Bitters ' is blown 
in the bottom." 

"Here's what it cures," pursued the 
agent, pointing at the side, where, in an in- 
verted pyramid, the names of several hun- 
dred diseases were arranged, running from 
"gout " to "pulmonary complaints," etc. 

"I gol ! she cuts a wide swath, don't 
she?" exclaimed Uncle Ethan, profoundly 
impressed with the list. 

"They ain't no better bitter in the 
world," said the agent, with a conclusive 
inflection. 

" What's its speshy-rt/ity ? Most of 'em 
have some speshy-«/ity." 

" Well — summer complaints — an' — an' — 
spring an' fall troubles — tones ye up, sort of. ' ' 

Uncle Ethan's forgotten pan was empty 
of his gathered bugs. He was deeply inter- 




What's its s, 
ality?" 




2 2 AUTHORS READINGS 

ested in this man. There was something he 
liked about him. 

" What does it sell fur? " he asked, after 
a pause. 

" Same price as them cheap medicines- 
dollar a bottle — big bottles, too. Want 
one ? ' ' 

11 Wal, mother ain't to home, an' I don't 
know as she'd like this kind. We ain't 
been sick f r years. Still, they's no tellin'," 
he added, seeing the answer to his objection 
in the agent's eyes. " Times is purty close, 
too, with us, y' see; we've jest built that 
stable ' ' 

"Say, I'll tell yeh what I'll do," said 
the stranger, waking up and speaking in a 
warmly generous tone. " I'll give you ten 
bottles of the bitter if you'll let me paint a 
sign on that barn. It won't hurt the barn 
a bit, and if you want 'o, you can paint it 
out a year from date. Come, what d' ye 
say?" 

"T guess I hadn't better." 

The agent thought that Uncle Ethan was 
after more pay, but in reality he was think- 
ing of what his little old wife would say. 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



2 3 



" It simply puts a family bitter in your 
home that may save you fifty dollars this 
comin' fall. You can't tell." 

Just what the man said after that Uncle 
Ethan didn't follow. His voice had a con- 
fidential purring sound as he stretched across 
the wagon-seat and talked on, eyes half shut. 
He straightened up at last, and concluded, 
in the tone of one who has carried his point : 

" So ! If you didn't want to use the 
whole twenty-five bottles y'rself, why ! sell 
it to your neighbors. You can get twenty 
dollars out of it easy, and still have five bot- 
tles of the best family bitter that ever went 
into a bottle." 

It was the thought of this opportunity to 
get a buffalo-skin coat that consoled Uncle 
Ethan as he saw the hideous black letters ap- 
pearing under the agent's lazy brush. 

It was the hot side of the barn, and paint- 
ing was no light work. The agent was 
forced to mop his forehead with his sleeve. 

"Say, hain't got a cooky or anything, 
and a cup o' milk handy ? " he said at the 
end of the first enormous word, which ran 
the whole length of the barn. 




' ' It simply puts- 



24 AUTHORS READINGS 

Uncle Ethan got him the milk and cooky, 
which he ate with an exaggeratedly dainty 
action of his fingers, seated meanwhile on 
the staging which Uncle Ripley had helped 
him to build. This lunch infused new en- 
ergy into him, and in a short time "Dodd's 
Family Bitters, Best in the Market," dis- 
figured the sweet-smelling pine-boards. 

Ethan was eating his self-obtained supper 
of bread and milk when his wife came home. 

" Who's been a-paintin' on that barn ? " 
she demanded, her bead-like eyes flash- 
ing, her withered little face set in an omi- 
nous frown. Ethan Ripley, what you been 
doin' ?" 

" Nawthin'," he replied, feebly. 

" Who painted that sign on there ? " 

"A man come along an' he wanted to 
paint that on there, and I let 'im ; and it's 
my barn, anyway. I guess I can do what 
I'm a min' to with it," he ended, defiantly ; 
but his eyes wavered. 

Mrs. Ripley ignored the defiance. "What 
under the sun p'sessed you to do such a 
thing as that, Ethan Ripley ? I declare I 




UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



25 



don't see ! You git fooler an' fooler ev'ry 
day you live, I do believe." 

Uncle Ethan attempted a defence. 

" Well, he paid me twenty-five dollars f r 
it, anyway." 

" Did 'e? " She was visibly affected by 
this news. 

"Well, anyhow, it amounts to that ; he 
give me twenty-five bottles " 

Mrs. Ripley sank back in her chair. 
" Well, I swan to Bungay ! Ethan Ripley — 
wal, you beat all I ever see ! ' ' she added in 
despair of expression. " I thought you had 
some sense left, but you hain't, not one 
blessed scimpton. Where is the stuff? " 

" Down cellar, an' you needn't take on 
no airs, ol' woman. I've known you to buy 
things you didn't need time an' time 'n' 
agin, tins and things, an' I guess you wish 
you had back that ten dollars you paid for 
that illustrated Bible." 

" Go 'long an' bring that stuff up here. 
I never see such a man in my life. It's a 
wonder he didn't do it f'r two bottles." 
She glared out at the sign, which faced di- 
rectly upon the kitchen window. 




f do believe. 




26 authors' readings 

Uncle Ethan tugged the two cases up and 
set them down on the floor of the kitchen. 
Mrs. Ripley opened a bottle and smelled of 
it like a cautious cat. 

"Ugh! Merciful sakes, what stuff ! It 
ain't fit f'r a hog to take. What'd you 
think you was goin' to do with it ? " she 
asked, in poignant disgust. 

" I expected to take it — if I was sick. 
Whaddy ye s'pose?" He defiantly stood 
his ground, towering above her like a lean- 
ing tower. 

" The hull cartload of it ? " 

" No. I'm goin' to sell part of it an' git 
me an overcoat ' ' 

"Sell it! " she shouted. "Nobuddy'll 
buy that sick'nin' stuff but an old numbskull 
like you. Take that slop out o' the house 
this minute ! Take it right down to the 
sink-hole an' smash every bottle on the 
stones. ' ' 

Uncle Ethan and the cases of medicine 
disappeared, and the old woman addressed 
her concluding remarks to little Tewksbury, 
her grandson, who stood timidly on one leg 
in the doorway, like an intruding pullet. 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



27 



" Everything around this place 'ud go to 
rack an' ruin if I didn't keep a watch on 
that soft-pated old dummy. I thought that 
lightenin'-rod man had give him a lesson 
he'd remember, but no, he must go an' 
make a reg'lar " 

She subsided in a tumult of banging pans, 
which helped her out in the matter of ex- 
pression and reduced her to a grim sort of 
quiet. Uncle Ethan went about the house 
like a convict on shipboard. Once she 
caught him looking out of the window. 

" I should think you'd feel proud o' that." 

Uncle Ethan had never been sick a day 
in his life. He was bent and bruised with 
never-ending toil, but he had nothing es- 
pecial the matter with him. 

He did not smash the medicine, as Mrs. 
Ripley commanded, because he had deter- 
mined to sell it. The next Sunday morn- 
ing, after his chores were done, he put on 
his best coat of faded diagonal, and was 
brushing his hair into a ridge across the cen- 
tre of his high, narrow head, when Mrs. 
Ripley came in from feeding the calves. 

" Where you goin' now ? " 




" Where you goin 
now ?" 



28 authors' readings 

"None o' your business," he replied. 
"It's darn funny if I can't stir without you 
wantin' to know all about it. Where's 
Tewky ? ' ' 

" Feedin' the chickens. You ain't goin' 
to take him off this mornin' now ! I don't 
care where you go." 

" Who's a-goin' to take him off? I ain't 
said nothin' about takin' him off." 

"Wal, take y'rself off, an' if y' ain't 
here f'r dinner, I ain't goin' to get no sup- 
per." 

Ripley took a water-pail and put four bot- 
tles of "the bitter" into it, and trudged 
away up the road with it in a pleasant glow 
of hope. All nature seemed to declare the 
day a time of rest, and invited men to dis- 
associate ideas of toil from the rustling green 
wheat, shining grass, and tossing blooms. 
Something of the sweetness and buoyancy of 
all nature permeated the old man's work- 
calloused body, and he whistled little 
snatches of the dance tunes he played on his 
fiddle. 

But he found neighbor Johnson to be sup- 
plied with another variety of bitter, which 




3 



"« 
£ 
& 



3° 



authors' readings 



was all he needed for the present. He quali- 
fied his refusal to buy with a cordial invita- 
tion to go out and see his shotes, in which 
he took infinite pride. But Uncle Ripley 
said : "I guess I'll haft' be goin' ; I want 
'o git up to Jennings' before dinner." 

He couldn't help feeling a little depressed 
when he found Jennings away. The next 
house along the pleasant lane was inhabited 
by a "new-comer." He was sitting on the 
horse-trough, holding a horse's halter, while 
his hired man dashed cold water upon the 
galled spot on the animal's shoulder. 

After some preliminary talk Ripley pre- 
sented his medicine. 

"Hell, no! What do I want of such 
stuff? When they's anything the matter 
with me, I take a lunkin' ol' swig of popple- 
bark and bourbon ? That fixes me. ' ' 

Uncle Ethan moved off up the lane. He 
hardly felt like whistling now. At the next 
house he set his pail down in the weeds be- 
side the fence, and went in without it. 
Doudney came to the door in his bare feet, 
buttoning his suspenders over a clean boiled 
shirt. He was dressing to go out. 




UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



3 1 



" Hello, Ripley. I was just goin' down 
your way. Jest wait a minute an' I'll be 
out." 

When he came out fully dressed Uncle 
Ethan grappled him. 

"Say, what d' you think o' pay tent 
med " 

" Some of 'em are boss. But y' want 'o 
know what y're gitt'n." 

" What d' ye think o' Dodd's " 

" Best in the market." 

Uncle Ethan straightened up and his face 
lighted. Doudney went on : 

" Yes, sir ; best bitter that ever went into 
a bottle. I know, I've tried it. I don't go 
much on patent medicines, but when I get a 
good — — ' ' 

" Don't want 'o buy a bottle ? " 

Doudney turned and faced him. 

"Buy! No. I've got nineteen bottles 
I want 'o sell. " Ripley glanced up at 
Doudney' s new granary and there read 
' ' Dodd's Family Bitters. ' ' He was stricken 
dumb. Doudney saw it all and roared. 

" Wal, that's a good one ! We two try- 
in' to sell each other bitters. Ho — ho — ho 




What d' ye think o 
Dodd's " 



3 2 



AUTHORS READINGS 



— har, whoop ! wal, this is rich ! How 
many bottles did you git? " 

"None o' your business," said Uncle 
Ethan, as he turned and made off, while 
Doudney screamed with merriment. 

On his way home Uncle Ethan grew 
ashamed of his burden. Doudney had can- 
vassed the whole neighborhood, and he prac- 
tically gave up the struggle. Everybody he 
met seemed determined to find out what he 
had been doing, and at last he began lying 
about it. 

" Hello, Uncle Ripley, what y' got there 
in that pail ? " 

" Goose eggs f'r settin'." 

He disposed of one bottle to old Gus 
Peterson. Gus never paid his debts, and he 
would only promise fifty cents "on tick" 
for the bottle, and yet so desperate was Rip- 
ley that this quasi sale cheered him up not 
a little. 

As he came down the road, tired, dusty 
and hungry, he climbed over the fence in 
order to avoid seeing that sign on the barn, 
and slunk into the house without looking 
back. 




UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



33 



He couldn't have felt meaner about it if 
he had allowed a Democratic poster to be 
pasted there. 

The evening passed in grim silence, and 
in sleep he saw that sign wriggling across the 
side of the barn like boa-constrictors hung 
on rails. He tried to paint them out, but 
every time he tried it the man seemed to 
come back with a sheriff, and savagely 
warned him to let it stay till the year was 
up. In some mysterious way the agent 
seemed to know every time he brought out 
the paint-pot, and he was no longer the 
pleasant-voiced individual who drove the 
calico ponies. 

As he stepped out into the yard next 
morning, that abominable, sickening, scrawl- 
ing advertisement was the first thing that 
claimed his glance — it blotted out the beau- 
ty of the morning. 

Mrs. Ripley came to the window, button- 
ing her dress at the throat, a wisp of her 
hair sticking assertively from the little knob 
at the back of her head. 

" Lovely, ain't it ! An' 7've got to see 
it all day long. I can't look out the winder 




Lovely, ain't itj 



34 



AUTHORS READINGS 



" -^ 




but that thing's right in my face." It 
seemed to make her savage. She hadn't 
been in such a temper since her visit to New 
York. "I hope you feel satisfied with it." 

Ripley walked off to the barn. His pride 
in its clean, sweet newness was gone. He 
slyly tried the paint to see if it couldn't be 
scraped off, but it was dried in thoroughly. 
Whereas before he had taken delight in hav- 
ing his neighbors turn and look at the build- 
ing, now he kept out of sight whenever he 
saw a team coming. He hoed corn away in 
the back of the field, when he should have 
been bugging potatoes by the roadside. 

Mrs. Ripley was in a frightful mood about 
it, but she held herself in check for several 
days. At last she burst forth : 

" Ethan Ripley, I can't stand that thing 
any longer, and I ain't goin' to, that's all ! 
You've got to go and paint that thing out, 
or I will. I'm just about crazy with it." 

"But, mother, I promised " 

" I don't care what you promised, it's got 
to be painted out. I've got the nightmare 
now, seein' it. I'm goin' to send f'r a pail 
o' red paint, and I'm goin' to paint that 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



35 



out if it takes the last breath I've got to 
do it." 

"I'll tend to it, mother, if you won't 
hurry me " 

" I can't stand it another day. It makes 
me boil every time I look out the winder." 

Uncle Ethan hitched up his team and 
drove gloomily off to town, where he tried 
to find the agent. He lived in some other 
part of the country, however, and so the old 
man gave up and bought a pot of red paint, 
not daring to go back to his desperate wife 
without it. 

" Goin' to paint y'r new barn?" in- 
quired the merchant, with friendly inter- 
est. 

Uncle Ethan turned with guilty sharp- 
ness ; but the merchant's face was grave and 
kindly. 

" Yes, I thought I'd touch it up a little — 
don't cost much." 

"It pays — always," the merchant said, 
emphatically. 

"Will it — stick jest as well put on even- 
ings?" inquired Uncle Ethan, hesitat- 
ingly. 




Drove gloomily off. ' 



36 authors' readings 

' ' Yes — won' t make any difference. Why ? 
Ain't goin' to have " 

" Wal — I kind o' thought I'd do it odd 
times night an' mornin' — kind o' odd 
times " 

He seemed oddly confused about it, and 
the merchant looked after him anxiously as 
he drove away. 

After supper that night he went out to 
the barn, and Mrs. Ripley heard him saw- 
ing and hammering. Then the noise ceased, 
and he came in and sat down in his usual 
place. 

"What y' ben makin' ? " she inquired. 
Tewksbury had gone to bed. She sat darn- 
ing a stocking. 

" I jest thought I'd git the stagin' ready 
f'r paintin," he said, evasively. 

"Wal! I'll be glad when it's covered 
up." When she got ready for bed, he was 
still seated in his chair, and after she had 
dozed off two or three times she began to 
wonder why he didn't come. When the 
clock struck ten, and she realized that he 
had not stirred, she began to get impatient. 
" Come, are y' goin' to sit there all night ? " 




"A lazy "June day." 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



39 



There was no reply. She rose up in bed and 
looked about the room. The broad moon 
flooded it with light, so that she could see 
he was not asleep in his chair, as she had 
supposed. There was something ominous 
in his disappearance. 

"Ethan! Ethan Ripley, where are 
yeh ? ' ' There was no reply to her sharp 
call. She rose and distractedly looked 
about among the furniture, as if he might 
somehow be a cat and be hiding in a corner 
somewhere. Then she went upstairs where 
the boy slept, her hard little heels making a 
curious funking noise on the bare boards. 
The moon fell across the sleeping boy like a 
robe of silver. He was alone. 

She began to be alarmed. Her eyes wid- 
ened in fear. All sorts of vague horrors 
sprang unbidden into her brain. She still 
had the mist of sleep in her brain. 

She hurried down the stairs and out into 
the fragrant night. The katydids were sing- 
ing in infinite peace under the solemn splen- 
dor of the moon. The cattle sniffed and 
sighed, jangling their bells now and then, 
and the chickens in the coops stirred un- 




Looked about. ' 




40 AUTHORS READINGS 

easily as if overheated. The old woman 
stood there in her bare feet and long night- 
gown, horror-stricken. The ghastly story 
of a man who had hung himself in his barn 
because his wife deserted him came into her 
mind and stayed there with frightful persist- 
ency. Her throat filled chokingly. 

She felt a wild rush of loneliness. She 
had a sudden realization of how dear that 
gaunt old figure was, with its grizzled face 
and ready smile. Her breath came quick 
and quicker, and she was at the point of 
bursting into a wild cry to Tewksbury, when 
she heard a strange noise. It came from the 
barn, a creaking noise. She looked that 
way, and saw in the shadowed side a deeper 
shadow moving to and fro. A revulsion to 
astonishment and anger took place in her. 

" Land o' Bungay ! If he ain't paintin' 
that barn, like a perfect old idiot, in the 
night. ' ' 

Uncle Ethan, working desperately, did 
not hear her feet pattering down the path, 
and was startled by her shrill voice. 

" Well, Ethan Ripley, whaddy y' think 
you're doin' now? " 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



41 



He made two or three slapping passes with 
the brush, and then snapped, "I'm a-paintin' 
this barn — whaddy ye s'pose? If ye had 
eyes y' wouldn't ask." 

"Well, you come right straight to bed. 
What d' you mean by actin' so ? " 

" You go back into the house an' let me 
be. I know what I'm a-doin'. You've 
pestered me about this sign jest about 
enough. ' ' He dabbed his brush to and fro 
as he spoke. His gaunt figure towered 
above her in shadow. His slapping brush 
had a vicious sound. 

Neither spoke for some time. At length 
she said, more gently, "Ain't you comin' 
in?" 

" No — not till I get a- ready. You go 
'long an' tend to y'r own business. Don't 
stan' there an' ketch cold." 

She moved off slowly toward the house. 
His voice subdued her. Working alone 
out there had rendered him savage ; he 
was not to be pushed any farther. She 
knew by the tone of his voice that he 
must not be assaulted. She slipped on her 
shoes and a shawl, and came back where 




" Don't stan there. 



42 



AUTHORS' READINGS 




The majestic moon 
swung." 



he was working, and took a seat on a saw- 
horse. 

" I'm a-goin' to set right here till you 
come in, Ethan Ripley," she said, in a firm 
voice, but gentler than usual. 

"Waal, you'll set a good while," was his 
ungracious reply. But each felt a furtive 
tenderness for the other. He worked on in 
silence. The boards creaked heavily as he 
walked to and fro, and the slapping sound 
of the paint-brush sounded loud in the sweet 
harmony of the night. The majestic moon 
swung slowly round the corner of the barn, 
and fell upon the old man's grizzled head 
and bent shoulders. The horses inside could 
be heard stamping the mosquitoes away, and 
chewing their hay in pleasant chorus. 

The little figure seated on the saw-horse' 
drew the shawl closer about her thin shoul- 
ders. Her eyes were in shadow, and her 
hands were wrapped in her shawl. At last 
she spoke in a curious tone. 

" Wal, I don't know as you was so very 
much to blame. I didn't want that Bible 
myself— I held out I did, but I didn't." 

Ethan worked on until the full meaning 



UNCLE ETHAN RIPLEY 



43 



of this unprecedented surrender penetrated 
his head, and then he threw down his 
brush. 

" Wal, I guess I'll let 'er go at that. 
I've covered up the most of it, anyhow. 
Guess we'd better go in." 




" Wal, I guess I'll let 'er go at that.' 



EUGENE FIELD 




And as he was dreaming, an angel song 
Awakened our Little Boy Blue — " 



^ih= 




I will recite three poems, " Long Ago" " Little Boy 
Blue," and " Seem' Things" the latter was suggested by a 
talk with a little boy friend of mine after hearing him 
scream out in his sleep. 



LONG AGO 

BY EUGENE FIELD 

I once knew all the birds that came 
And nested in our orchard trees ; 
For every flower I had a name ; 

My friends were woodchucks, toads, and 
bees ; 
I knew where thrived in yonder glen 

What plants would soothe a stone-bruised 
toe — 
Oh, I was very learned then ; 

-r, , ,1 . i , " Oh, I was very 

But that was very long ago ! >-./,*» 

•' o o learned, then. 




I knew the spot upon the hill 

Where checkerberries could be found ; 
I knew the rushes near the mill 

Where pickerel lay that weighed a pound ! 
I knew the wood — the very tree — 

Where lived the poaching, saucy crow ; 
All the woods and crows knew me — 

But that was very long ago ! 



4 8 



AUTHORS READINGS 




I'd wish to be a 
again?' 1 



And pining for the joys of youth, 

I tread the old familiar spot 
Only to learn this solemn truth : 

I have forgotten, am forgot. 
Yet here's this youngster at my knee 

Knows all the things I used to know. 
To think I once was wise as he — 

But that was very long ago ! 
I know it's folly to complain 

Of whatsoe'er the Fates decree ; 
Yet were not wishes all in vain, 

I tell you what my wish should be : 
I'd wish to be a boy again, 

Back with the friends I used to know ; 
For I was, oh ! so happy then — 

But that was very long ago ! 





/ knew the wood — the very tree — 
Where lived the poaching, saucy crow" 



LITTLE BOY BLUE 



BY EUGENE FIELD 

The little toy dog is covered with dust, 

But sturdy and stanch he stands ; 
And the little toy soldier is red with rust, 

And his musket moulds in his hands. 
Time was when the little toy dog was new 

And the soldier was passing fair, 
And that was the time when our Little Boy 
Blue 

Kissed them and put them there. 




' ' But sturdy and 
stanch he stands." 



" Now, don't you go till I come," he said, 

" And don't you make any noise ! " 
So toddling off to his trundle-bed 

He dreamt of the pretty toys. 
And as he was dreaming, an angel song 

Awakened our Little Boy Blue — 
Oh, the years are many, the years are long, 

But the little toy friends are true. 



52 AUTHORS READINGS 

Ay, faithful to Little Boy Blue they stand, 

Each in the same old place, 
Awaiting the touch of a little hand, 

The smile of a little face. 
And they wonder, as waiting these long 
years through, 

In the dust of that little chair, 
What has become of our Little Boy Blue 

Since he kissed them and put them there. 




1 What has become of our Little Boy Bhic. 



SEEIN' THINGS 

BY EUGENE FIELD 

I ain't afeard uv snakes, or toads, or bugs, 
or worms, or mice, 

An' things 'at girls are skeered uv I think 
are awful nice ! 

I'm pretty brave, I guess; an' yet I hate to 
go to bed, 

For, when I'm tucked up warm an' snug an' 
when my prayers are said, 

Mother tells me ' ' Happy dreams ! ' ' and 
takes away the light, 

An' leaves me lyin' all alone an' seein' 
things at night ! 

Sometimes they're in the corner, sometimes 
they're by the door, 

Sometimes they're all a-standin' in the mid- 
dle uv the floor ; 

Sometimes they are a-sittin' down, some- 
times they're walkin' round 




I'm pretty brave, I 
guess." 



54 



authors' readings 




"P'inlin' 1 at me — so f" 



So softly and so creepy-like they never make 

a sound ! 
Sometimes they are as black as ink, an' other 

times they're white — 
But the color ain't no difference when you 

see things at night ! 

Once, when I licked a feller 'at had just 
moved on our street, 

An' father sent me up to bed without a bite 
to eat, 

I woke up in the dark an' saw things stand- 
in' in a row, 

A-lookin' at me cross-eyed an' p'intin' at 
me — so ! 

Oh, my ! I wuz so skeered that time I never 
slep' a mite — 

It's almost alluz when I'm bad I see things 
at night ! 



Lucky thing I ain't a girl, or I'd be skeered 

to death ! 
Bein' I'm a boy, I duck my head an' hold 

my breath ; 
An' I am, oh ! so sorry I'm a naughty boy, 

an' then 



56 



AUTHORS READINGS 



I promise to be better an' I say my prayers 

again ! 
Gran'ma tells me that's the only way to 

make it right 
When a feller has been wicked an' sees 

things at night. 




An' so, when other naughty boys would 

coax me into sin, 
I try to skwush the Tempter's voice 'at 

urges me within ; 
An' when they's pie for supper, or cakes 

'at's big an' nice, 
I want to — but I do not pass my plate f r 

them things twice ! 
No, ruther let Starvation wipe me slowly 

out o' sight 
Than I should keep a-livin' on an' seein' 

things at night ! 



" / try to skwush the 
Tempter's voice." 



MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD 




Three times they pulled up-stream and floated dow i past the friars. 




/ will read the last chapter of the story " The Little 
Renault." It will be necessary for the reader to go with me 
back to the year 1682, when La Salle and his followers were 
exploring the "jalley of the Illinois. 



THE LITTLE RENAULT 



BY MARY IIARTWELL CATHERIVOOD 




faded." 



The canoe was so leaky that it had to be 
pulled ashore when Tonty's party had rowed 
•up-stream about twenty-five miles. They 
camped early in the afternoon. The two 
priests built a fire, while Boisrondet and 
L'Esperance cut branches, and with these " While the autumn 

, , , , , , r , afternoon dimmed and 

and blankets made a couple of knotty mat- f ndprJ » 
tresses, on which Tonty and the little Re- 
nault could rest Avith their feet toward 
the blaze. Tonty's wound was again bleed- 
ing. After efforts to mend the boat he 
dropped upon his pallet in deadly sickness, 
and lay there while the autumn afternoon 
dimmed and faded out as if the smile of 
God were being withdrawn from the world. 
Father Ribourde and Father Membre, 
tended both patients with all their monastic 
skill. The little Renault was full of delirious 



6o 



AUTHORS READINGS 




'As night came on.' 



laughter. L'Esperance, while he labored 
on the boat with such calking as the woods 
afforded, groaned over the lad's state and 
reproached himself for ever grudging the 
child service. Boisrondet worked at drag- 
ging fuel as if his one desire was to exhaust 
himself and die. As night came on he piled 
a fire of huge size, though it was a danger- 
ous beacon, for they were camped on a flat 
and wooded strip some distance from shel- 
tering bluffs, and their light perhaps drew 
other prowlers than the Iroquois. During 
the night there were stirrings in thickets, and 
once a soft dip or two in the river, as if a 
canoe paddle had incautiously lapsed to its 
usual motion. 

After a meagre supper Father Membre 
and L'Esperance lay down to sleep while 
Father Ribourde and Boisrondet kept guard. 
The weather was changing, and a chill wind 
swept along the river valley. It continually 
scattered the little Renault's curls over her 
fever-swollen face, and Boisrondet, unable 
to endure this, built up a screen of brush. 
He sat on the ground beside her pallet, and 
Father Ribourde sat at the other side, 



THE LITTLE RENAULT 



6l 



though the priest rose at intervals and ex- 
amined Tonty. 

The whole pile of burning logs was heaped 
between the little Renault and Tonty. He 
lay opposite her, with his feet, also, to the 
fire, sleeping as only exhausted frontiersmen 
can sleep. Nothing in woods or stooping 
clouds, or in the outcry of spirits around 
him, reached his consciousness all that night. 
He was suspended from the world in a swoon 
of sleep. His swarthiness was so blanched 
by loss of blood that his black hair and 
mustache startled the eye. Father Ribourde 
listened for his breath, into such deep re- 
cesses had his physical life made its retreat. 

But the girl on the opposite side of the 
fire brought echoes from the darkness. She 
sang. She thought she was dancing in a 
whirl along peaks, or fishing in the river 
with L'Esperance, or shooting arrows at a 
mark with young Indians, or moving across 
the prairie with Tonty on his errand to the 
Iroquois. Through every act ran gladness. 
She exulted upward through the fire-gilt 
branches. 

" O Mother of God, what joy thou hast 




She exulted up- 
ward." 



62 



AUTHORS' READINGS 




•' — think of that / " 



given me ! If there had been no Monsieur 
de Tonty — think of that ! Then I should 
have crouched like fields blackened in frost. 
Then I should not know what life is. How 
desolate— to be without Monsieur de Tonty ! 
The savages and the wretches at Crevecoeur, 
they are all like grasshoppers beside him. 
I would rather have him call me his little 
lad than be Queen of France." 

The priest's soothing had no effect on 
her fever - driven imagination. She drank 
when he held a cup to her mouth, and stared 
at him, still laughing. But during several 
hours there was scarcely a pause in her talk 
of Tonty. 

Boisrondet sat behind her back- — for she 
lay upon her sound shoulder — and endured 
all this. The flower of martyrdom and the 
flower of love bloomed there before the 
priest in the dank woods beside the collaps- 
ing camp-fire. The lonesome, low wail of 
wind was contradicted by the little Renault's 
glad monotone. All the innocent thoughts 
which a girl pours out to her mother this 
motherless girl poured out to Tonty. It 
was a confession more sacred than any made 



THE LITTLE RENAULT 63 

to a priest. Boisrondet put his hands upon 
his ears. 

Ruddy embers shone on Father Membre 
and L'Esperance, Recollet's capote, and ser- 
vant's shaggy dress rising and falling in uni- 
son throughout the night ; for the watchers 
did not wake them at all. 

When Father Ribourde rose up again to 
look at Tonty, Boisrondet crept to his place 
and sat by the delirious girl's head. The 
priest said nothing, and accepted the change. 
It became his care to keep the little Renault 
from jarring her wound with her groping 
hands. 

Boisrondet 's eyes may have pierced the 
floating veil of delirium to her consciousness. 
The smile of vague happiness which she 
gave the priest turned to a look of solici- 
tude. 

" Sieur de Boisrondet, did I hurt you? " 
she cried. 

He shook his head. / I / \ 

" Forgive the blow." ' Forgive the blow. 

"I was grateful for it," muttered Bois- 
rondet. 

Still his heart-broken eyes pierced the pa- 




6 4 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Did I hurt you ? ' 



vilion of her gladness, and she cried out 
again : 

" Sieur de Boisrondet, did I hurt you ? " 

" No, no, no ! " 

" Forgive the blow." 

" O saints in heaven ! " the man groaned, 
holding his head in his hands. 

" How good is God," said the little Re- 
nault, returning to her heights, " who made 
all His creatures so happy ! My Monsieur 

de Tonty, my Monsieur de Tonty " So 

she moved on through the clouds. 

Tonty awoke at daybreak and stood up 
weak and giddy, looking first at the palle 
on the other side of the sylvan hearth. A 
stiff small figure was covered there, and 
Boisrondet was stretched beside it, face 
downward on the ground. 

"The poor little lad! " groaned Tonty, 
coming down on one knee and lifting a 
blanket edge. "When did he die, Bois- 
rondet? " 

Without moving Boisrondet said, from the 
ground : 

" She died not long after midnight." 
Her face in its pillow of black curls was a 



THE LITTLE RENAULT 65 

marble dream of gladness. She had the 
wonderful beauty of dead children, and 
Ton ty saw her as a dead child rather than as 
a woman triumphant in flawless happiness, 
whose uninhabited face smiled on at her 
wondrous fate. She had seen her hero in 
his splendor without man -cruelty and petti- 
ness. The world had been a good place to 
the little Renault. 

Father Ribourde had no candles to put at 
her head and feet, but he knelt, saying pray- 
ers for her peace. 

The day was chill and sullen, and occa- 
sional spatters of sleet glazed twigs and grass 
tufts. Father Membre and L'Esperance 
silently took the labors of the camp upon 
themselves. They dug roots to add to the 
scant breakfast and brought fuel. Boisron- 
det made no response to priest or comman- 
dant, but lay on the ground without eat- 
ing until the slate-gray afternoon began to 
thicken. 

" Boisrondet," then said Tonty, stopping, 
and taking his subaltern by the shoulder, 
"the Indians left us not a tool, as you 
know. We cannot hollow out any grave 




Boisrondet made no 
response. " 



66 



AUTHORS READINGS 




which would be deep enough to keep the 
little lad from the wolves." 

Boisrondet shivered as if he were begin- 
ning to feel the sleet in his hair and on the 
little Renault's blanket. 

" We shall have to sink him in the river, 
Boisrondet. Be a man." 

Boisrondet rose directly, with fierce readi- 
ness to do the thing at once if it must be 
done. He did not look at her again, but 
sat under a tree with his back turned while 
preparations were made. 

L'Esperance brought many stones, and 
the priests ballasted and wound the body in 
the best blankets the camp afforded, tying 
the packet well with buffalo thongs. They 
placed it in the canoe, and Tonty called 
Boisrondet. 

Both Recollets stood on the bank repeat- 
ing prayers while Tonty and Boisrondet 
pulled up against the current. The river 
was a dull monster, but a greedy one, 
reaching for its prey through the boat's 
seams. 

"Will this do, Boisrondet?" appealed 
Tonty. 



Will this do f " 



THE LITTLE RENAULT 



6 7 



can- 



" Pull a little farther, monsieur. I 
not bear it yet." 

Tonty with his single-handed stroke con- 
tinued to help hold their boat against the 
current. 

Three times they pulled up-stream and 
floated down past the friars. 

"Will this do, Boisrondet?" twice re- 
peated Tonty. Twice the answer was : 

" Monsieur, I cannot bear it yet." 

The commandant avoided gazing at 
Boisrondet's misery. His fraternal gaze 
dwelt on the blanket chrysalis of the little 
Renault. He would have given his remain- 
ing hand — which meant his future career — 
to bring back the boy's life, but even to his 
large sympathy Boisrondet's passion was like 
a sealed house. It had been impossible for 
him to grasp the feminine quality in that 
lad's black curls and flower-fresh face. 

" My poor Boisrondet," he urged, " we 
must have the courage to lift the little lad 
and do for him what he would do for us." 

"Lad ! lad ! " burst out the other with 
scoffing. "Always lad to you — the sweet- 
est woman that ever drew breath ! " His 




Pull a little 
farther." 



68 authors' readings 

voice broke down, and he distorted his face, 
sobbing aloud. 

Tority broke down and sobbed with him. 
They arose with a desperate impulse together, 
the man she loved and the other man who 
loved her, lifted their heavy burden, poised, 
swung, and threw it out upon the water. 
It smote the river and sank, and their canoe 
reeled with the splashing and surging of a 
disturbed current. Tonty staggered and sat 
down, gripping the sides of the boat, feeling 
his wound start afresh. Nature's old sigh 
swept across the wind-harp of tree-tops. The 
river composed itself and again moved stead- 
ily, perhaps rocking the packet in some 
pebbly hollow, perhaps passing it on toward 
the Mississippi. And the priests' voices 
concluded their monotone for the dead. 

" Heaven give him sweet rest in this river 
of the Illinois ! " uttered Tonty. But Bois- 
rondet said nothing more. 




" M. QUAD." 




A man leaps out of the thicket." 




/ will read a sketch entitled " The Last of His Race" 
also a bed-time conversation between two little boys called 
" The Bovs About the House." 



THE LAST OF HIS RAGE 

BY "M. QUAD" 

An hour before sunset he came out of his 
hiding-place on the banks of the Little Mis- 
souri. Hunger drove him out. He sniffed 
the air and looked about him like a fugitive. 
He was a fugitive. His once proud bearing 
had given place to the demeanor of a skulk- 
er. The fire in his eye had died out ; he 
had become thin and weak; he started in 
alarm as a coyote sneaked out of the bushes 
above him and gave utterance to a dismal 
howl. He startled by the voice of such a 
creature — he, the grand old buffalo bull who 
had led a herd of thousands in a hundred 
wild stampedes, who had known no con- 
queror, who had traversed half a continent 
unchecked by man or the obstacles of nature ! 

He lifted his head and looked to the south. 
From the Canadian line and beyond, down 
to the very waters of the Rio Grande, the 




7 2 



AUTHORS READINGS 




And now the end has 
come / " 



American bison could once be found in 
numbers absolutely countless. Their migra- 
tion made a continent tremble. Their stam- 
pedes made mountains rock. A strip of 
country two thousand miles long by six hun- 
dred broad had been their pasture ground. 
A thousand streams had been made to quench 
their thirst — a thousand fords created that 
they might pass in safety. 

And now the end has come ! If there 
was one single living buffalo between him 
and the waters lapping the far shores of 
Texas, it was some craven in hiding like 
himself. From the Laramie plains to the 
waters of the Elkhorn, from north to south 
of a continent, the plains, and prairies, and 
valleys yielded up the monuments of man's 
cupidity in the shape of bleaching skeletons. 
They bleached in the sun by day and black- 
ened under the dews of night. At every 
yard was a skull polished by the teeth of 
wolf, and bear, and coyote ; at every rod a 
skeleton with bones falling apart and half- 
hidden in the grass. Even amidst the firs, 
and cedars, and pines on the hillsides were 
bones — carried there by the vultures, who 



THE LAST OF HIS RACE 



73 



feasted and grew fat and were lethargic with 
over-feeding. Down in the dark and dismal 
ravines, where the foot of man had never trod, 
up canyons where the darkness and silence 
were like a horrible nightmare, there were 
skulls, and ribs, and thigh-bones, dragged 
away by panther, and grizzly, and wildcat. 

Scarred by arrows, wounded by bullets, 
pursued by foes from valley to valley and 
from river to river, the whilom monarch has 
at last found a covert and a breathing- spell 
for a day. He has skulked like a wounded 
wolf; he has crouched like a fox in his lair. 
The cry of a vulture hovering high above 
had made him tremble — he who had driven 
the dreaded grizzly out of his path 'more 
than once, and whose sharp, stout horns 
had sent more than one Indian pony to his 
death ! 

Ah ! But the cries of the coyote have 
brought company ! They come sneaking 
out of thicket, and grass, and crevice until 
there are a dozen. The youngest calf of a 
herd would not fear them, and yet their 
angry snarls make the old monarch tremble ! 
The sun seems to drop into a lower notch as 




He has skulked like 
a wounded wolf. ' ' 



74 



AUTHORS READINGS 




His head i 
highy 



the old monarch moves softly about to snatch 
a bite here and there, but always keeping 
his eye on the pack. As the craving of 
hunger becomes partly satisfied, the fire 
comes back to his eyes, and he even gives 
his head a defiant toss. If their howling 
brings the savage wolf, he will die fighting 
— he will die game. He has fought them a 
hundred battles, and never suffered defeat. 

Here they come ! He looks up to find 
himself almost encircled. They are hungry 
and gaunt. Their eyes blaze and foam 
he l d falls from their lips as they close in on him. 
Now, watch him ! He is no longer the 
fugitive — the craven, trembling at every 
sound. His head is' held high; there is a 
royal fire in his great eyes, and he utters a 
low bellow of defiance and paws the earth as 
a challenge for them to come on. 

Crack ! Crash ! Hurrah ! 

The bull totters, sways to and fro, and 
falls to the earth, shot through the heart. A 
man leaps out of the thicket, waves his hat 
and gun, and cheers the success of his shot, 
while the wolves sneak away into the twi- 
light and growl and snap at each other. 



THE LAST OF HIS RACE 



75 



The last of his race is dead. He would 
have died fighting as a monarch should, but 
man prevented. It is the last hide — the 
last feast for wolves and vultures — the last 
monument to mark man's savagery when 
stirred by cupidity and selfishness. 




The last of his race is dead.' 



THE BOYS AROUND THE HOUSE 

BV "71/. QUAD" 

Surely you must have seen a boy of eight 
or ten years of age get ready for bed ? His 
shoestrings are in a hard knot, and after a 
few vain efforts to unlace them he rushes 
after a case-knife and saws each string in 
two. One shoe is thrown under the table, 
the other behind the stove, his jacket behind 
the door, and his stockings are distributed 
over as many chairs as they will reach. 

The boy doesn't slip his pants off; he 
struggles out of them, holding a leg down 
with his foot and drawing his limbs out after 
many stupendous efforts. While doing this 
his hands are clutched into the bedclothes, 
and by the time he is ready to get into bed 
the quilts and sheets are awry and the bed is 
full of humps and lumps. His brother has 
gone through the same motions, and both 
finally crawl into bed. They are good boys, 




' ' They are good boys. 



78 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Hain't either, ma ! " 



and they love each other, but they are 
hardly settled on their backs when one cries 
out — 

"Hitch along! " 

" I won't," bluntly replies the other. 

"Ma, Bill's got more'n half the bed! " 
cries the first. 

" Hain't either, ma ! " replies Bill. 

There is a moment of silence, and then 
the first exclaims — 

" Get yer feet off'n me ! " 

"They hain't touching you!" is the 
answer. 

"Yes, they be, and you're on my pillow, 
too! " 

" Oh ! my stars, what a whopper ! You'll 
never go to heaven ! ' ' 

The mother looks into the bedroom and 
kindly says — 

"Come, children, be good, and don't 
make your mother any trouble. ' ' 

"Well," replies the youngest, " if Bill '11 
tell me a bear story I'll go to sleep." 

The mother withdraws, and Bill starts 
out — 

"Well, you know, there was an old bear 



THE BOYS AROUND THE HOUSE 



79 



who lived in a cave. He was a big black 
bear. He had eyes like coals of fire, you 
know, and when he looked at a feller he — " 

"Ma, Bill's scaring me! " yells Henry, 
sitting on end. 

" Oh, ma ! that's the awfullest story you 
ever heard ! ' ' replies Bill. 

" Hitch along, I say ! " exclaims Henry. 

" I am along ! " replies Bill. 

" Get yer knee out'n my back ! " 

" Hain't anywhere near ye ! " 

' ' Gimme some cloze ! ' ' 

" You've got more'n half now ! " 

" Come, children, do be good and go to 
sleep," says the mother, entering the room 
and arranging the clothes. 

They doze off after a few muttered words, 
to preserve the peace until morning, and it 
is popularly supposed that an angel sits on 
each bedpost to sentinel either curly head 
during the long, dark hours.. 




'An angel sits on each 
bedpost." 



ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 




" But one by one we must all file on 
Through the narrow aisles oj pain." 




I will read the poems " Which Are You?" "Solitude" 
and " The Beautiful Land of Nod." 



WHICH ARE YOU? 

BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 

There are two kinds of people on earth to- 
day, 

Just two kinds of people ; no more, I say. 

Not the sinner and saint, for it's well under- 
stood, 

The good are half bad, and the bad are half 
good. 

Not the rich and the poor, for to count a 
man's wealth 

You must first know the state of his con- 
science and health. 

Not the humble and proud, for in life's little 
span, 

Who puts on vain airs, is not counted a man. 

Not the happy and sad, for the swift-flying 

years 
Bring each man his laughter and each man 

his tears. 




' ' The good are half 
bad." 



8 4 



AUTHORS READINGS 



No ; the two kinds of people on earth that 

I mean, 
Are the people who lift and the people who 

lean. 

Wherever you go, you will find the earth's 

masses, 
Are always divided in just these two classes, 
And, oddly enough, you will find, too, 1 

ween, 
There is only one lifter to twenty who lean. 

In which class are you? Are you easing the 

load, 
Of overtaxed lifters, who toil down the road ? 
Or are you a leaner, who lets others bear 
Your portion of labor and worry and care ? 




" hi which class are you 9 " 



SOLITUDE 

BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 

Laugh, and the world laughs with you ; 

Weep, and you weep alone, 
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth, 

But has trouble enough of its own. 
Sing, and the hills will answer ; 

Sigh, it is lost on the air, 
The echoes bound to a joyful sound, 

But shrink from voicing care. 




"Laugh, andthe world- 
laughs ivith you." 



Rejoice, and men will seek you ; 

Grieve, and they turn and go. 
They want full measure of all your pleasure, 

But they do not need your woe. 
Be glad, and your friends are many ; 

Be sad, and you lose them all — 
There are none to decline your nectar' d 
wine, 

But alone you must drink life's gall. 



86 



authors' readings 



Feast, and your halls are crowded ; 

Fast, and the world goes by. 
Succeed and give, and it helps you live, 

But no man can help you die. 
There is room in the halls of pleasure 

For a large and lordly train, 
But one by one we must all file on 

Through the narrow aisles of pain. 




THE BEAUTIFUL LAND OF NOD 

BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 

Come, cuddle your head on my shoulder, 
dear, 
Your head like the golden-rod, 
And we will go sailing away from here 

To the beautiful Land of Nod. 
Away from life's hurry, and flurry, and 
worry, 
Away from earth's shadows and gloom, 
To a vorld of fair weather we'll float off to- 
gether 
Where roses are always in bloom. 

Just shut up your eyes, and fold your hands, 
Your hands like the leaves of a rose, 

And we will go sailing to those fair lands 
That never an atlas shows. 

On the North and the West they are bound- 
ed by rest, 
On the South and the East, by dreams ; 




-cuddle your head on 
my shoulder, — " 



88 authors' readings 

'Tis the country ideal, where nothing is 
real, 
But everything only seems. 

Just drop down the curtains of your dear 
eyes, 
Those eyes like a bright blue-bell, 
And we will sail out under starlit skies, 
To the land where the fairies dwell. 
Down the river of sleep, our barque shall 
sweep, 
Till it reaches that mystical Isle 
Which no man hath seen, but where all have 
been, 
And there we will pause awhile. 
I will croon you a song as we float along, 

To that shore that is blessed of God, 
Then ho ! for that fair land, we're off for 
that rare land, 
That beautiful Land of Nod. 




OPIE READ 




The sun is blazing out in the fields and the June-bugs 
are buzzing in the yard. 




On turning over a book of my first short stories 1 have 
found " A Backwoods Sunday," a sketch I once memor- 
ized and will now endeavor to recite. 



A BACKWOODS SUNDAY 



BY OPIE READ 



A Sunday in the backwoods of Tennes- 
see, viewed by one whose feet rarely stray 
from the worn paths of active life, may 
hold nothing attractive, but to the old men 
and women — the youth and maiden of the 
soil — it is a poem that comes once a week 
to encourage young love with its soft senti- 
ment and soothe old labor with its words of 
promise. In the country where the streams 
are so pure that they look like strips of sun- 
shine, where the trees are so ancient that 
one almost stands in awe of them, where the 
moss, so old that it is gray, and hanging 
from the rocks in the ravine, looks like 
venerable beards growing on faces that have 
been hardened by years of trouble — in such 
a country even the most slouching clown, 
walking as though stepping over clods when 



"It is a poem. 



9 2 



AUTHORS READINGS 




' He muses." 



ploughing where the ground breaks up hard, 
has in his untutored heart a love of poetry. 
He may not be able to read — may never 
have heard the name of a son of genius, but 
in the evening, when he stands on a pur- 
ple "knob," watching the soul of day sink 
out of sight in a far-away valley, he is a 
poet. 

When the shadow of Saturday night falls 
upon a backwoods community in Tennes- 
see, a quiet joy seems to lurk in the atmos- 
phere. The whippoorwill has sung unheeded 
every night during the week, but to-night 
his song brings a promise of rest. The tired 
boy sits in the door, and, taking off his 
shoes, strikes them against the log door-step 
to knock the dirt out; and the cat that has 
followed the women when they went to milk 
the cows, comes and rubs against him. The 
humming-bird, looking for a late supper, 
buzzes among the honeysuckle blossoms, and 
the tree-toad cries in the locust-tree. The 
boy goes to bed, thrilled with an expecta- 
tion. He muses: "I will see somebody 
to-morrow." 

On the morrow the woods are full of 



A BACKWOODS SUNDAY 



93 



music. The great soul of day rises with a 
burst of glory, and the streams, bounding 
over the rocks or dreaming among the ferns, 
laugh more merrily and seem to be brighter 
than they were yesterday. Horses neigh 
near an old log-church and a swelling hymn 
is borne away on the blossom-scented air. 
The ploughboy, sitting near the spring, heeds 
not the sacred music, but gazes intently 
down the shady road. He sees some one 
coming — sees the fluttering of a gaudy rib- 
bon and is thrilled. A young woman comes 
up the road, coyly tapping an old mare with 
a dogwood switch, and eager lest some one 
else may perform the endearing office, he 
hastens to help the young woman to alight. 
He tries to appear unconcerned as he takes 
hold of the bridle-rein, but he stumbles 
awkwardly as he leads the animal toward the 
horse-block. When he has helped her down 
and has tied the horse it is his blessed privi- 
lege to walk with the girl as far as the 
church-door. 

"What's Jim a-doin'?" he asks, as they 
walk along under the embarrassing gaze of a 
score of men. 




' ' The great soul of day 
rises " 



94 



AUTHORS READINGS 




' What's Alf 
a-doin ? " 



"Ploughed yistidy; ain't doin' nothin' 
to-day. ' ' 

"Be here to-day, I reckon," he rejoins. 

"He went to preachin' at Ebeneezer." 

"What's Tom a-doin' ? " 

"Went to mill yistidy; ain't doin' nothin' 
to-day. ' ' 

"Be here to-day, I reckon." 

"He 'lowed he mout, but I don't know 
whether he will or not. ' ' 

"What's Alf a-doin'?" 

' ' Cut sprouts an' deadened trees yistidy ; 
ain't doin' nothin' to-day." 

"Be here to-day, I reckon." 

"Yes, 'lowed he was a-comin' with Sue 
Prior. ' ' 

"Anybody goin' home with you, Liza?" 

"Not that I know of." 

"Wall, if nobody else ain't spoke, I'd 
like to go." 

"We'll see about it," she answers, and 
then enters the church. He saunters off 
and sits down under a tree where a number 
of young men are wallowing on shawls 
spread on the grass. The preacher becomes 
warm in his work and the ploughboy hears 



A BACKWOODS SUNDAY 



95 



him exclaim : ' ' What can a man give in 
exchange for his own soul; " but he is not 
thinking of souls, or of an existence beyond 
the horizon of this life ; his mind is on the 
girl with the gaudy ribbon, and he is asking 
his heart if she loves him. The shadows are 
now shorter and hungry men cast glances at 
the sun, but the preacher, shouting in broken 
accents, appears not to have reached the first 
mile-stone of his text, and it is evident that 
he started out with the intention of going a 
" Sabbath-day's journey." One young fel- 
low places his straw hat over his face and 
tries to sleep, but some one tickles him with 
a spear of grass. An old man who has 
stood it as long as he could in the house, 
and who has come out and lain down, gets 
up, stretches himself, brushes a clinging leaf 
off his gray jeans trousers and declares : 
" A bite to eat would hit me harder than a 
sermon writ on a rock. Don't see why a 
man wants to talk all day. ' ' 

' ' Thought you was mighty fond of 
preachin', Uncle John," some one remarks. 

" Am, but I don't want a man to go over 
an' over what he has already dun said. If 




' — his mind is on the 
girl — " 



g6 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Bet you don't.' 



my folks wa'n't in thar I'd mosey off home 
an' git suthin' to eat." 

" Good book says a man don't live by 
bread alone, Uncle John." 

" Yas, but it don't say that he lives by 
preachin' alone, nuther. Hoi' on ; they 
are singin' the doxology now, an' I reckon 
she will soon be busted." 

The ploughboy goes home with his divin- 
ity — Uncle John's daughter. "Reckon 
Jim will be at home? " he asks, as they ride 
along. 

"He mout be. Air you awful anxious 
to see him ? ' ' 

"Not so powerful. Jest 'lowed I'd ask. 
I know who's yo' sweetheart," he says, after 
a pause. 

"Bet you don't." 

"Bet I do." 

" Who is it then, Mr. Smarty? " 

"Aleck Jones." 

"Who, him? Think I'd have that 
freckle-faced thing?" 

" Wall, if he ain't, I know who is." 

"Bet you couldn't think of his name in 
a hundred years." 



9 8 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Pd "whale him. '' 



" You mout think I can't, but I can.", 

"Wall, who, then, since you are so 
smart ? ' ' 

" Morg Atcherson." 

"Ho, I wouldn't speak to him if I was 
to meet him in the road." 

"But you'd speak to some people if you 
was to meet them in the road, wouldn't 
you?" 

"Yes, of course I would." 

' ' Who would you speak to ? " 

" Oh, lots of folks. Did you see that bird 
almost hit me? " she suddenly exclaims. 

" I reckon he 'lowed you was a flower." 

"Oh, he didn't, no such of a thing. 
You ought to be ashamed of yo'se'f to make 
fun of me thater way." 

" I wa'n't makin' fun of you. Ho, if I 
was ter ketch anybody makin' fun of you it 
wouldn't be good for him." 

" What would you do ? " 

"I'd whale him." 

" You air awful brave, ain't you? " 

" Never mind whut I am ;. I know that if 
any man was to make fun of you he'd have 
me to whup." 



A BACKWOODS SUNDAY 



99 



A number of people have stopped at 
Uncle John's house. They sit in the large 
passageway running between the two sections 
of the log-building, and the men, who have 
not heard the sermon, discuss it with the 
women who were compelled to hear it from 
halting start to excited finish. The sun is 
blazing out in the fields and the June-bugs 
are buzzing in the yard. It is indeed a day 
of rest for the young and old, but is it a 
restful time for the housewife? Does that 
woman, with flushed face, running from the 
kitchen to the dining-room, and then to the 
spring-house for the crock jar of milk, ap- 
pear to be resting ? Do the young men and 
women who are lolling in the passage realize 
that they are making a slave of her ? Prob- 
ably not, for she assures them that it is not 
a bit of trouble, yet when night comes — 
when the company is gone — she sinks down, 
almost afraid to wish that Sunday might 
never come again, yet knowing that it is the 
day of her heavy bondage. Old labor has 
been soothed and young love has been en- 
couraged, but her trials and anxieties have 
been more than doubled. 




// is indeed a day of 
rest. 



160 



AUTHORS* READINGS 



It is night, and the boy sits in the door 
taking off his shoes. To-morrow he must 
go into the hot field, but he does not think 
of that. His soul is full of a buoyant love 
— buoyant, for the girl with the gaudy rib- 
bon has promised to be his wife. 




BILL NYE 




" A morning scamper through a conservatory when the 
syringas and jonquils and jack roses lie cuddled up to- 
gether in their little beds, is a thing to remember and 
look back to and pay for." 




With your patient indulgence I will tell you " How to Hunt 
the Fox " and will also deliver one of my essays on sleep, entitled 
" A Blasted Snore." 



HOW TO HUNT THE FOX 

BY BILL NYE 

The joyous season for hunting is again 
upon us, and with the gentle fall of the au- 
tumn leaf and the sough of the scented 
breezes about the gnarled and naked limbs 
of the wailing trees, the huntsman comes 
with his hark and his halloo and hurrah, 
boys, the swift rush of the chase, the thrill- 
ing scamper 'cross country, the mad dash 
through the Long Islander's pumpkin-patch 
• — also the mad dash, dash, dash of the farm- 
er, the low moan of the disabled and frozen- 
toed hen as the whooping horsemen run her 
down ; the wild shriek of the children, the 
low, melancholy wail of the frightened shoat 
as he flees away to the straw pile, the quick 
yet muffled plunk of the frozen tomato, and 
the dull scrunch of the seed cucumber. 

The huntsman now takes the flannels off 




' The huntsman comes.' 



io4 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Meander up the 
flume." 



his fox, rubs his stiffened limbs with gar- 
gling oil, ties a bunch of firecrackers to his 
tail, and runs him around the barn a few 
times to see if he is in good order. 

The foxhound is a cross of the blood- 
hound, the greyhound, the bulldog, and the 
chump. When you step on his tail he is 
said to be in full cry. The foxhound ob- 
tains from his ancestors on the bloodhound 
side of the house his keen scent, which en- 
ables him while in full cry 'cross country to 
pause and hunt for chipmunks. He also ob- 
tains from the bloodhound branch of his 
family a wild yearning to star in an "Uncle 
Tom ' ' company, and watch little Eva me- 
ander up the flume, at two dollars per week. 
From the greyhound he gets his most mirac- 
ulous speed, which enables him to attain a 
rate of velocity so great that he is unable to 
halt during the excitement of the chase, fre- 
quently running so far during the day that 
it takes him a week to get back, when, of 
course, all interest has died out. From the 
bulldog the foxhound obtains his great tenac- 
ity of purpose, his deep-seated convictions, 
his quick perceptions, his love of home and 



HOW TO HUNT THE FOX 



I°5 



his clinging nature. From the chump the 
foxhound gets his high intellectuality and 
that mental power which enables him to dis- 
tinguish almost at a glance the salient points 
of difference between a two-year-old steer 
and a two-dollar bill. 

The fox - hound is about two feet in 
height, and one hundred and twenty of 
them would be considered an ample number 
for a quiet little fox-hunt. Some hunters 
think this number inadequate, but unless the 
fox be unusually skittish and crawl under the 
barn, one hundred and twenty foxhounds 
ought to be enough. The trouble generally 
is that hunters make too much noise, thus 
scaring the fox so that he tries to get away 
from them. This necessitates hard riding 
and great activity on the part of the whip- 
pers-in. Frightening a fox almost always 
results in sending him out of the road and 
compelling horsemen to stop in order to 
take down a panel of fence every little while 
that they may follow the animal, and before 
you can get the fence put up again the own- 
er is on the ground, and after you have 
made change with him and mounted again 




' ' Ought to be enough. 



io6 



AUTHORS READINGS 




the fox may be nine miles away. Try by 
all means to keep your fox in the road ! 

It makes a great difference what kind of 
fox you use, however. I once had a fox on 
my Pumpkin Butte estates that lasted me 
three years, and I never knew him to shy or 
turn out of the road for anything but a load- 
ed team. He was the best fox for hunting 
purposes that I ever had. Every spring I 
would sprinkle him with Scotch snuff and 
put him away in the bureau till fall. He 
would then come out bright and chipper. 
He was always ready to enter into the chase 
with all the chic and embonpoint of a regu- 
lar Kenosha, and nothing pleased him better 
than to be about eight miles in advance of 
my thoroughbred pack in full cry, scamper- 
ing 'cross country, while stretching back a 
few miles behind the dogs followed a pale 
young man and his fiancier, each riding a 
horse that had sat down too hard on his tail 
some time and driven it into his system 
about six joints. 

Some hunters, who are madly and passion- 
ately devoted to the sport, leap their horses 
over fences, moats, donjon keeps, hedges, 



HOW TO HUNT THE FOX 



I07 



and currant bushes with utter sang-froid and 
the wild, unfettered toot ongsomble of a 
brass band. It is one of the most spirited 
and touchful of sights to see a young fox- 
hunter going home through the gloaming 
with a full cry in one hand and his pancreas 
in the other. 

Some like to be in at the death, as it is 
called, and it is certainly a laudable ambi- 
tion. To see one hundred and twenty dogs 
hold out against a ferocious fox weighing 
nine pounds ; to watch the brave little band 
of dogs and whippers - in and horses with 
sawed-off tails, making up in heroism what 
they lack in numbers, succeeding at last in 
ridding the country of the ferocious brute 
which has long been the acknowledged foe 
of the human race, is indeed a fine sight. 

We are too apt to regard fox-hunting 
merely as a relaxation, a source of pleasure, 
and the result of a desire to do the way peo- 
ple do in the novels which we steal from 
English authors ; but this is not all. To 
successfully hunt a fox, to jump fences 'cross 
country like an unruly steer, is no child's 
play. To ride all day on a very hot and 




Is indeed a fine 
sight." 



io8 



AUTHORS READINGS 




1 -A freight car is the 
best thing." 



restless saddle, trying to lope while your 
horse is trotting, giving your friends a good 
view of the country between yourself and 
your horse, then leaping stone walls, break- 
ing your collar-bone in four places, pulling 
out one eye and leaving it hanging on a 
plum-tree, or going home at night with your 
transverse colon wrapped around the pom- 
mel of your saddle and your liver in an old 
newspaper, requires the greatest courage. 

Too much stress cannot be placed upon 
the costume worn while fox-hunting, and in 
fact, that is, after all, the life and soul of 
the chase. For ladies, nothing looks better 
than a close-fitting jacket, sewed together 
with thread of the same shade, and a skirt. 
Neat-fitting cavalry boots and a plug hat 
complete the costume. Then, with a hue in 
one hand and a cry in the other, she is pre- 
pared to mount. Lead the horse up to a 
stone wall or a freight car and spring lightly 
into the saddle with a glad cry. A freight 
car is the best thing from which to mount a 
horse, but it is too unwieldy and frequently 
delays the chase. For this reason, too, much 
luggage should not be carried on a fox-hunt. 



AUTHORS READINGS 




Some gentlemen carry a change of canes, 
neatly concealed in a shawl-strap, but even 
this may be dispensed with. 

For gentlemen, a dark, four-button cut- 
away coat, with neat, loose-fitting white- 
panties, will generally scare a fox into con- 
vulsions, so that he may be easily killed with 
a club. A short-waisted plug hat may be 
worn also, in order to distinguish the hunter 
from the whipper-in, who wears a baseball cap. 
The only fox-hunting I have ever done was 
on board an impetuous, tough-bitted, fore- 
and-aft horse that had emotional insanity. I 
was dressed in a swallow-tail coat, waistcoat 
of Scotch plaid Turkish towelling, and a 
pair of close-fitting breeches of etiquette 
tucked into my boot-tops. As I was away 
from home at the time and could not reach 
my own steed I was obliged to mount a 
spirited steed, with high, intellectual hips, 
one white eye, and a big red nostril that you 
could set a Shanghai hen in. This horse, 
as soon as the pack broke into full cry, 
climbed over a fence that had wrought-iron 
briers on it, lit in a corn-field, stabbed his 
hind leg through a sere and yellow pumpkin, 



HOW TO HUNT THE FOX 



III 



which he wore the rest of the day, with 
seven yards of pumpkin vine streaming out 
behind, and away we dashed 'cross country. 
I remained mounted not because I enjoyed 
it, for I did not, but because I dreaded to 
dismount. I hated to get off in pieces. If 
I can't get off a horse's back as a whole, I 
would rather adhere to the horse. I will 
adhere that I did so. 

We did not see the fox, but we saw almost 
everything else. I remember, among other 
things, of riding through a hothouse, and 
how I enjoyed it. A morning scamper 
through a conservatory when the syringas 
and jonquils and jack roses lie cuddled up 
together in their little beds, is a thing to re- 
member and look back to and pay for. To 
stand knee-deep in glass and gladiolas, to 
smell the mashed and mussed up mignonette 
and the last fragrant sigh of the scrunched 
heliotrope beneath the hoof of your horse, 
while far away the deep-mouthed baying 
of the hoarse hounds, hotly hugging the 
reeking trail of the anise-seed bag, calls on 
the gorgeously caparisoned hills to give back 
their merry music or fork it over to other 




112 



AUTHORS READINGS 




answering hills, is joy to the huntsman's 
heart. 

On, on I rode with my unconfined locks 
streaming behind me in the autumn wind. 
On and still on I sped, the big, bright 
pumpkin slipping up and down the gambrel 
of my spirited horse at every jump. On, 
and ever on, we went, shedding terror and 
pumpkin-seeds along our glittering track till 
my proud steed ran his leg in a gopher hole 
and fell over one of those machines that they 
put on a high-headed steer to keep him from 
jumping fences. As the horse fell, the neck- 
lace of this hickory poke flew up and ad- 
justed itself around my "throat. In an in- 
stant my steed was on his feet again, and 
gayly we went forward while the prong of 
this barbarous appliance, ever and anon 
ploughed into a brand new culvert or rooted 
up a clover field. Every time it ran into 
an orchard or a cemetery it would jar my 
neck and knock me silly. But I could see 
with joy that it reduced the speed of my 
horse. At last as the sun went down, reluc- 
tantly, it seemed to me, for he knew that he 
would never see such riding again, my ill- 



HOW TO HUNT THE FOX 



IX 3 



spent horse fell with a hollow moan, curled 
up, gave a spasmodic quiver with his little, 
nerveless, sawed-off tail, and died. 

The other huntsmen succeeded in treeing 
the anise-seed bag at sundown, in time to 
catch the six o'clock train home. 

Fox-hunting is one of the most thrilling 
pastimes of which I know, and for young 
men whose parents have amassed large sums 
of money in the intellectual pursuit of hides 
and tallow, the meet, the chase, the scamper, 
the full cry, the cover, the stellated fracture, 
the yelp of the pack, the yip, the yell of 
triumph, the confusion, the whoop, the holla, 
the hallos, the hurrah, the abrasion, the snort 
of the hunter, the concussion, the sward, the 
open, the earth-stopper, the strangulated 
hernia, the glad cry of the hound as he 
brings home the quivering seat of the peas- 
ant's pantaloons, the yelp of joy as he lays 
at his master's feet, the strawberry mark of 
the rustic — all, all are exhilarating to the 
sons of our American nobility. 

Fox-hunting combines the danger and the 
wild tumultuous joy of the skating-rink, the 
toboggan slide, the mush-and-milk sociable, 
and the straw ride. 




1 Fell "with a hollow 
moan." 



A BLASTED SNORE 

BY BILL NYE 

Sleep, under favorable circumstances, is a 
great boon. Sleep, if natural and undis- 
turbed, is surely as useful as any other scien- 
tific discovery. Sleep, whether administered 
at home or abroad, under the soporific influ- 
ences of an underpaid preacher or the un- 
yielding wooden cellar-door that is used as a 
blanket in the sleeping-car, is a harmless 
dissipation and a cheerful relaxation. 

Let me study a man for the first hour after 
he has wakened and I will judge him more 
correctly than I would to watch him all 
winter in the Legislature. We think we are 
pretty well acquainted with our friends,. but 
we are not thoroughly conversant with their 
peculiarities until we have seen them wake 
up in the morning. 

I have often looked at the men I meet and 
thought what a shock it must be to the wives 




'A cheerful relaxa- 
tion." 



n6 



AUTHORS READINGS 




" That fell on her 
father's heart." 



of some of them to wake up and see their 
husbands before they have had time to pre- 
pare, and while their minds are still chaotic. 

The first glimpse of a large, fat man, whose 
brain has drooped down behind his ears, and 
whose wheezy breath wanders around through 
the catacombs of his head and then emerges 
from his nostrils with a shrill snort like the 
yelp of the damned, must be a charming 
picture for the eye of a delicate and beautiful 
second wife ; one who loves to look on green 
meadows and glorious landscapes; one who 
has always wakened with a song and a ripple 
of laughter that fell on her father's heart 
like a shower of sunshine in the sombre green 
of the valley. 

It is a pet theory of mine that to be pleas- 
antly wakened is half the battle for the day. 
If we could be wakened by the refrain of a 
joyous song, instead of having our. front 
teeth knocked out by one of those patent 
pillow-sham holders that sit up on their hind 
feet at the head of the bed, until we dream 
that we are just about to enter Paradise and 
have just passed our competitive examina- 
tion, and which then swoop down and mash 




Under the soporific influences of an underpaid preacher. 



n8 



authors' readings 




'Makes the hair full." 



us across the bridge of the nose, there would 
be less insanity in our land and death would 
be regarded more .in the light of a calamity. 

When you waken a child do it in a pleas- 
ant way. Do not take him by the ear and 
pull him out of bed. It is disagreeable for 
the child, and injures the general tout ensem- 
ble of the ear. Where children go to sleep 
with tears on their cheeks and are wakened 
by the yowl of dyspeptic parents, they have 
a pretty good excuse for crime in after years. 
If I sat on the bench in such cases I would 
mitigate the sentence. 

It is a genuine pleasure for me to wake up 
a good-natured child in a good-natured way. 
Surely it is better from those dimpled lids to 
chase the sleep with a caress than to knock 
out slumber with a harsh word and a bed- 
slat. 

No one should be suddenly wakened from 
a sound sleep. A sudden awaking reverses 
the magnetic currents, and makes the hair 
pull, to borrow an expression from Dante. 
The awaking should be natural, gradual, and 
deliberate. 

A sad thing occurred last summer on an 



A BLASTED SNORE 



119 



Omaha train. It was a very warm day, and 
in the smoking-car a fat man, with a magenta 
fringe of whiskers over his Adam's apple, and 
a light, ecru lambrequin of real camel's-hair 
around the suburbs of his head, might have 
been discovered. 

He could have opened his mouth wider, 
perhaps, but not without injuring the main- 
spring of his neck and turning his epiglottis 
out of doors. 

He was asleep. 

He was not only slumbering, but he was 
putting the earnestness and passionate devo- 
tion of his whole being into it. His shiny, 
oil-cloth grip, with the roguish tip of a dis- 
carded collar just peeping out at the side, 
was up in the iron wall-pocket of the car. 
He also had, in the seat with him, a market- 
basket full of misfit lunch and a two-bushel 
bag containing extra apparel. On the floor 
he had a crock of butter with a copy of the 
Punkville Palladium and Stock - Grower' 's 
Guardian over the top. 

He slumbered on in a rambling sort of a 
way, snoring all the time in monosyllables, 
except when he erroneously swallowed his 




Up in the iron wall- 
pocket." 




&*0v 



W y ^ x ft 3 



■7 ' ■■: ( 






($$?: 



*9 

He was asleep. 



A BLASTED SNORE 



121 



tonsils, and then he would struggle awhile 
and get black in the face, while the passen- 
gers vainly hoped that he had strangled. 

While he was thus slumbering, with all 
the eloquence and enthusiasm of a man in 
the full meridian of life, the train stopped 
with a lurch, and the brakeman touched his 
shoulder. 

"Here's your town," he said. "We 
only stop a minute. You'll have to hustle." 

The man, who had been far away, wres- 
tling with Morpheus, had removed his hat, 
coat, and boots, and when he awoke his feet 
absolutely refused to go back into the same 
quarters. 

At first he looked around reproachfully at 
the people in the car. Then he reached up 
and got his oil-cloth grip from the bracket. 
The bag was tied together with a string, and 
as he took it down the string untied. Then 
we all discovered that this man had been on 
the road for a long time, with no object, ap- 
parently, except to evade laundries. All 
kinds of articles fell out in the aisle. I re- 
member seeing a chest-protector and a linen 
coat, a slab of seal-brown gingerbread and 




You 11 have to 
hustle." 



122 AUTHORS' READINGS 

a pair of stoga boots, a hair-brush and a 
bologna sausage, a plug of tobacco and a 
porous plaster. 

He gathered up what he could in both 
arms, made two trips to the door and threw 
out all he could, tried again to put his num- 
ber eleven feet into his number nine boots 
gave it up, and socked himself out of the 
car as it began to move, while the brakeman 
bombarded him through the window for two 
miles with personal property, groceries, dry- 
goods, boots and shoes, gents' furnishing 
goods, hardware, notions, bric-a-brac, red 
herrings, clothing, doughnuts, vinegar bit- 
ters, and facetious remarks. 

Then he picked up the retired snorer's 
railroad check from the seat, and I heard 
him say: "Why, dog on it, that wasn't his 
town after all." 




WILL CARLETON 




•' / touched him on religio7i, and the joys my heart had 
known : 
And I found that he had very similar notions of his 
own." 




;i\ wm^mmmk 




4 f *Jl§fi - 'mm 






I will recite " 7%£ Christmas Baby " and " 7%^ Lightning 
Rod Dispenser "from Farm Legends. 




THE CHRISTMAS BABY 

BY WILL CARLETON 

" Th'art welcome, little bonny brid, 

But shouldn't ha' come just when tha' did : 
Teimes are bad." 
— English Ballad. 

Hoot ! ye little rascal ! ye come it on me 

this way, 
Crowdin' yerself amongst us this blusterin' " Crvwdiri yerseif 

winter's day, amongst us." 1 

Knowin' that we already have three of ye, 

an' seven, 
An' tryin' to make yerself out a Christmas 

present o' Heaven ? 

Ten of ye have we now, Sir, for this world 

to abuse ; 
An' Bobbie he have no waistcoat, an' Nellie 

she have no shoes, 



126 



authors' readings 




— ye rascal / 



An' Sammy he have no shirt, Sir (I tell it to 

his shame), 
An' the one that was just before ye we ain't 

had time to name ! 

An' all o' the banks be smashin', an' on us 

poor folk fall ; 
An' Boss he whittles the wages when work's 

to be had at all ; 
An' Tom he have cut his foot off, an' lies in 

a woful plight, 
An' all of us wonders at mornin' as what we 

shall eat at night ; 

An' but for your father an' Sandy a-findin' 

somewhat to do, 
An' but for the preacher's good wife, who 

often helps us through, 
An' but for your poor dear mother a-doin' 

twice her part, 
Ye'd 'a' seen us all in heaven afore ye was 

ready to start ! 

An' now ye have come, ye rascal ! so healthy 

an' fat an' sound, 
A weighin', I'll wager a dollar, the full of a 

dozen pound ! 



THE CHRISTMAS BABY 



I27 



With yer mother's eyes a-flashin', yer father's 

flesh an' build, 
An' a good big mouth an' stomach all ready 

for to be filled ! 

No, no ! don't cry, my baby ! hush up, my 

pretty one ! 
Don't get my chaff in yer eye, boy — I only 

was just in fun. 
Ye' 11 like us when ye know us, although 

we're cur' us folks; 
But we don't get much victual, an' half our 

livin' is jokes ! 

Why, boy, did ye take me in earnest ? come, 

sit upon my knee ; 
]'ll tell ye a secret, youngster, I'll name ye 

after me. 
Ye shall have all yer brothers an' sisters 

with ye to play, 
An' ye shall have yer carriage, an' ride out 

every day ! 

Why, boy, do ye think ye'll suffer? I'm 

gettin' a trifle old, 
But it'll be many years yet before I lose my 

hold: 




I only was just in 
fun." 



128 



AUTHORS READINGS 



An' if I should fall on the road, boy, still, 

them's yer brothers there, 
An' not a rogue of 'em ever would see ye 

harmed a hair ! 

Say ! when ye come from heaven, my little 

namesake dear, 
Did ye see, 'mongst the little girls there, a 

face like this one here ? 
That was yer little sister — she died a year 

ago, 
An' all of us cried like babies when they laid 

her under the snow ! 

Hang it ! if all the rich men I ever see or 

knew 
Came here with all their traps, boy, an' 

offered them for you, 
I'd show them to the door, Sir, so quick 

they'd think it odd, 
Before I'd sell to another my Christmas gift 

from God ! 




' Before I'd sell to another — " 



THE LIGHTNING-ROD DISPENSER 



BY WILL CARLETON 

Which this railroad reminds me, in an un- 
derhanded way, 

Of a lightning-rod dispenser that came down 
on me one day ; 

Oiled to order in his motions — sanctimonious 
in his mien — 

Hands as white as any baby's, an' a face un- 
nat'ral clean ; 

Not a wrinkle had his raiment, teeth and 
linen glittered white, 

And his new-constructed neck-tie was an in- 
terestin' sight ! 

Which I almost wish a razor had made red 
that white-skinned throat, 

And that new-constructed neck-tie had com- 
posed a hangman's knot, 




His new-constructed 
neck-tie." 



130 



authors' readings 



Ere he brought his sleek-trimmed carcass for 

my woman-folks to see, 
And his buzz-saw tongue a-runnin' for to 

gouge a gash in me ! 




1 1 pointed up the path- 
way.'''' 



Still I couldn't help but like him — as I fear 

I al'ays must, 
The gold o' my own doctrines in a fellow- 
heap o' dust ; 
For I saw that my opinions, when I fired 

'em round by round, 
Brought back an answerin' volley of a mighty 

similar sound. 
I touched him on religion, and the joys my 

heart had known : 
And I found that he had very similar notions 

of his own. 
I told him of the doubtings that made sad 

my boyhood years : 
Why, he's laid awake till morning with that 

same old breed of fears ! 
I pointed up the pathway that I hoped to 

heaven to go : 
He was on that very ladder, only just a round 

below ! 



THE LIGHTNING-ROD DISPENSER 13I 



Our politics was different, and at first he 
galled and winced ; 

But I arg'ed him so able, he was very soon 
convinced. 

And 'twas tow'rd the middle of a hungry 
summer day — 

There was dinner on the table, and I asked 
him, would he stay? 

And he sat him down among us — everlastin' 
trim and neat — 

And he asked a short, crisp blessin', almost 
good enough to eat ! 

Then he fired upon the mercies of our Ever- 
lastin' Friend, 

Till he gi'n the Lord Almighty a good first- 
class recommend ; 

And for full an hour we listened to that 
sugar-coated scamp — 

Talkin' like a blessed angel — eatin' like a 
blasted tramp ! 




And he sat him 
down." 



My wife — she liked the stranger, smiling on 

him warm and sweet ; 
(It al'ays flatters women when their guests 

are on the eat !) 



132 



AUTHORS READINGS 



And he hinted that some ladies never lose 
their youthful charms, 

And caressed her yearlin' baby, an' received 
it in his arms. 

My sons and daughters liked him — for he 
had progressive views, 

And he chewed the cud o' fancy, and gi'n 
down the latest news ; 

And I couldn't help but like him — as I 
fear I al'ays must, 

The gold of my own doctrines in a fellow- 
heap o' dust. 



He was chiselin' desolation through a piece 

of apple-pie, 
When he paused and gazed upon us, with a 

tear in his off-eye, 
With a tear in his And said, "Oh, happy family! — your joys 

off-eye." faey ma ] ce me sa( J J 

They all the time remind me of the dear 

ones once I had ! 
A babe as sweet as this one ; a wife almost 

as fair ; 
A little girl with ringlets — like that one over 

there. 





" Like that one over there.'''' 



THE LIGHTNING-ROD DISPENSER 1 33 

But had I not neglected the means within 

my way, 
Then they might still be living, and loving 

me to-day. 



"One night there came a tempest; the 

thunder-peals were dire ; 
The clouds that marched above us were 

shooting bolts of fire ; 
In my own house I, lying, was thinking, to 

my blame, 
How little I had guarded against those bolts 

of flame, 
When crash ! — through roof and ceiling the 

deadly lightning cleft, 
And killed my wife and children, and only 

I was left. 

" Since then afar I've wandered, and naught 
for life I've cared, 

Save to save others' loved ones whose lives 
have yet been spared ; 

Since then it is my mission, where'er by 
sorrow tossed, 

To sell to worthy people good lightning- 
rods at cost. 




Only I was left." 




134 



authors' readings 




I— signed it ! " 



With sure and strong protection I'll clothe 

your buildings o'er ; 
'Twill cost you — twenty dollars (perhaps a 

trifle more ; 
Whatever else it comes to, at lowest price 

I'll put; 
You simply sign a contract to pay so much 

per foot "). 

I — signed it ! while my family, all approvin' 

stood about ; 
The villain dropped a tear on't — but he 

didn't blot it out ! 
That self-same day, with wagons came some 

rascals great and small ; 
They hopped up on my buildin's just as if 

they owned 'em all; 
They hewed 'em and they hacked 'em — 

ag'in' my loud desires — 
They trimmed 'em off with gewgaws, and 

they bound 'em down with wires. 
They hacked 'em and they hewed 'em, and 

they hewed and hacked 'em still, 
And every precious minute kep' a-runnin' 

up a bill. ^f 




" A-runnin up a bill." 



THE LIGHTNING-ROD DISPENSER 135 

To find my soft-spoke neighbor, did I rave 

and rush an' run : 
He was suppin' with a neighbor, just a few 

miles farther on. 
"Do you think," I loudly shouted, "that 

I need a mile o' wire, 
For to save each separate haycock out o' 

heaven's consumin' fire ? 
Did you think, to keep my buildin's out o' 

some uncertain harm, 
I was goin' to deed you over all the balance 

of my farm ? ' ' 

He silenced me with silence in a very little 
while, 

And then trotted out the contract with a re- 
assuring smile ; 

And for half an hour explained it, with ex- 
asperating skill, 

While his myrmurdums kep' probably a-run- 
nin' up my bill. 

He held me to that contract with a firmness 
queer to see ; 

'Twas the very first occasion he had dis- 
agreed with me ! 




' I loudly shouted.' 




He had disagreed with me. 



136 



AUTHORS READINGS 



And for that 'ere thunder story, ere the ras- 
cal finally went, 

I paid two hundred dollars, if I paid a single 
cent. 

And if any lightnin' rodist wants a dinner- 
dialogue 

With the restaurant department of an enter- 
prisin' dog, 

Let him set his mouth a-runnin', just inside 
my outside gate ; 

And I'll bet two hundred dollars that he 
don't have long to wait. 




cs I'll bet two hundred dollars. 






%&r£% 




*3L (W* " 



Jo fi^rX ! 3 OTK*. I"** '"""' ** ^ • 

~ lUQewu JvUdJ. 



"THE CHILDREN'S POET" 



Eugene Field was born in St. Louis, 
Mo., on the third day of September, 1850. 
He died in Chicago on the fourth day of 
November, 1895. 

Mr. Field was of New England stock, his 
parents being Vermonters. Roswell M. 
Field, his father, was a man of marked in- 
tellectuality. He was Dred Scott's first at- 
torney in the case which resulted in the 
famous Dred Scott decision by the United 
States Supreme Court. Eugene Field's 
mother died in 1857, and the boy, who was 
then seven years old, went to 
live with his aunt, Miss Mary 
Field French, of Amherst, Mass. 
He remained under her care un- 
til he 



was 
nineteen ^ 
years of age. 

When he 4 
was nine 



^A 




The Eugene Field Home, 
Buena Park, Chicago. 



144 "THE CHILDREN S POET 

years old he went for a seventeen months' 
visit to the old homestead in Vermont, where 
his grandmother lived. It was his first expe- 
rience of country life, and he has said that 
his love of nature dated from that visit. His 
grandmother, who was an old-school New 
England Congregationalist, gave young Field 
thorough discipline in Biblical lore. She 
gave him ten cents for every sermon he wrote, 
and Eugene, being phenomenally versatile 
even at that age, earned a good many dimes. 
The first money he earned in a literary way 
was by writing those sermons. Although he 
did not like it, his grandmother made him 
commit to memory section after section of 
the Bible, with the result that in later life 
he regarded his knowledge of the holy book 
as invaluable. His father had taken pains 
to perfect him in the classics. He required 
the correspondence between them to be car- 
ried on in Latin. 

Between 1868 and 187 1 Mr. Field at- 
tended successively Williams College, Knox 
College, at Galesburg, 111., and the Missouri 
State University, at Columbia. His father 
died in 1869. In 187 1, having attained 



"THE CHILDREN'S POET 



145 



his majority, he came into possession of 
$60,000, his share of his father's estate. 
What he did with that money was typical of 
his generosity. He took one of his intimate 
friends, a brother of the lady (Julia S. Com- 
stock, of St. Joseph, Mo.) he afterward mar- 
ried, and went to Europe. 

" I spent six months and my patrimony 
in France, Italy, Ireland and England," is 
the way Field described the trip. " I just 
threw the money around. Just think of it, 
a boy of twenty-one, without father or 
mother, and with $60,000 ! It was a lovely 
experience. I had money. I paid it out 
for experience — it was plenty. Experience 
was lying around loose." All his life his 
money was apt to go in gratification of the 
impulse of the moment. 

On his return home with an empty purse, 
he went into journalism, beginning as a re- 
porter on the St. Louis "Journal." Subse- 
quently he was city editor of the St. Joseph 
" Gazette," editorial writer on the St. Louis 
"Journal" and St. Louis "Times-Jour- 
nal," managing editor of the Kansas City 
"Times" and the Denver "Tribune." In 




Mr. Field's pict- 
uresque rainy 
day garb. 



146 



THE CHILDREN'S POET 




How Mr. Field got his 
salary increased. 



1883 he went to the Chicago "News" 
(now the " Record ") and began the daily 
column of " Sharps and Flats," which made 
him one of the best known and most relished 
newspaper writers in the country. His con- 
nection with that paper continued until his 
death. There was rarely a day that 
Field's full column failed to appear, but 
de of this task he found time to do 
much additional writing, to lect- 
ure and read from his works, 
and to produce most of the child 
poems which have made him uni- 
versally famous. 

The way in which Mr. Field 
once secured an increase of salary 
from the editor of the Chicago 
" News " is characteristic of the 
man. Morning after morning he 
had gone to the office fully re- 
solved to make a demand for 
more pay in the customary form, for the 
need of an increase had grown pressing ; 
but each time his heart failed him. Sud- 
denly, one morning, there appeared before 
the astonished editor a tall, starved-looking 



"THE CHILDREN'S POET " 147 

man of beggarly aspect, followed by a line 
of the most pitiable-looking children imagin- 
able. The clothes of all were tattered and 
worn, and their faces were dirty, gaunt, and 
hungry. It was Field, his four small chil- 
dren, and several sorry-looking specimens of 
childhood whom he had picked up on the 
street. The players had been well coached. 
All stretched forth pleading hands and 
looked appealingly into the editor's eyes, 
and Mr. Field, with a beggar's sadness, 
asked: "Please, sir, won't you raise my 
salary ? ' ' The prayer was promptly granted. 
For some years before his death Mr. Field 
lived in a very attractive home in Buena 
Park, a suburb of Chicago, and there, in 
what he loved to call his "den," he did 
much of his better work. In that " den," 
literally almost buried in newspapers, sur- 
rounded by thousands of objects, beautiful 
or grotesque, which showed the rage of the 
collector, he wrought methodically many 
hours a day, taking wonderful pains with his 
work, pondering and doubting, revising and 
revising again. He sat in an arm-chair that 
once belonged to Jefferson Davis, and on his 



148 "THE CHILDREN'S POET " 

table was an inkstand used by Napoleon. 
Near at hand were Charles A. Dana's scissors 
and Gladstone's famous axe, presented to 
him by Mr. Gladstone himself. Scores of me- 
chanical toys and small images, hundreds of 
dolls and odd bottles of different shapes and 
sizes, old China, strange pewter dishes were 
all jumbled together about him. 
In writing of his likes and dis- 
likes, Mr. Field said, among oth- 
er things : "I believe in ghosts, 
in witches, and in fairies. I 
adore dolls. I dislike all exer- 
cise, and play all games indiffer- 
Eugene Field's ently. I love to read in bed. 

work-shop. I hate wars, armies, soldiers, 

guns, and fireworks. If I could 
have my way I should make the abuse of 
horses, dogs, and cattle a penal offence; I 
should abolish all dog laws and dog-catchers, 
and I would punish severely everybody who 
caught and caged birds. ' ' The poet often 
had canaries in his "den," but they were 
not confined to the limits of a cage. They 
flew about the room, often alighting on his 
shoulders while he wrote. 




"THE CHILDREN'S POET " I49 

The accompanying full-page picture of 
Mr. Field was made at his home one hot 
day in August, 1894. While posing, with 
the usual injunction not to move any more 
than necessary, he heard the patter of his lit- 
tle boy " Posey's " feet on the stairs. 

"Come, 'Posey'; come to papa," he 
called. Forgetting his special sitting, he 
went to the door, caught the lusty little fel- 
low in his arms, came back, and sat down, 
saying, caressingly : " Well, course, 'Posey' 
wants his picture taken, too." A new leaf 
was turned in the sketch-book, and the pict- 
ure of father and child was made. Other 
children came in during the sitting, and still 
others could be heard playing in the yard. 
There were children everywhere. Mr. Field 
loved to have it so. Retaining as a man 
much of his own boyish sportfulness, he 
easily made himself with children as one of 
themselves. The sketch being finished the 
poet wrote under it an appropriate stanza 
from " Long Ago," and inscribed in a cor- 
ner of the drawing, in his fine hand : " Buena 
Park, 111., ' The Creche,' " and, after writ- 
ing it, he looked up with a smile and said : 



150 " THE CHILDREN'S POET " 

" You know people always call our place 
'The Creche.' Pretty good name, too." 

Among the published works of Eugene 
Field are: "A Little Book of Western 
Verse," "A Little Book of Profitable 
Tales," "With Trumpet and Drum," 
"Second Book of Verse," "Love Songs 
of Childhood," "Love Affairs of a Biblio- 
maniac," "Echoes from the Sabine Farm," 
and "The Holy Cross and Other Tales." 
All but the last two are published by Charles 
Scribner's Sons, New York. 

The three poems selected for this volume 
are used with permission from the author 
and the publishers. 

" Seem' Things" is from "Love Songs 
of Childhood," "Little Boy Blue" and 
' ' Long Ago ' ' from ' ' A Little Book of 
Western Verse." 







/dL/ 1 



" A PIONEER POET " 

Will Carleton, among the first of na- 
tive poets to idealize in song the simple 
farm life of our country, was born on the 
twenty-first day of October, 1845,011 a farm 
near Hudson, Mich. His father was a prac- 
tical, hard-working, pioneer farmer. His 
mother often wrote verses of merit. Mr. 
Carleton was filled with an ambition to be- 
come a poet when he was a mere lad. His 
first poem, written when he was ten years 
old, was a letter in rhyme to an older sister. 
That sister had considerable poetic talent her- 
self, but she died at an early age. The lad 
was also ambitious to become an orator, and 
to that end practised in the fields of the farm, 
with the sheep, cows, and horses as an audi- 
ence. He had an eager desire for learning, 
going to the District School winters and 
working on his father's farm summers. 

A course at the village High School being 
completed, he longed to go to College. His 



154 " A PIONEER POET 

father could not afford to send him, so he 
taught school for four years at sixteen dollars 
a month, in order to earn the money necessary 
to make a start. At the age of twenty-one he 
entered Hillsdale College, at Hillsdale, Mich. 
He ran short of money at the close of his 
Junior year. That was campaign year, 1868, 
and he wrote a campaign poem entitled 
"Fax." He decided to "try it on" in 
a town at a distance from Hillsdale. A 
small room was hired in which to deliver the 
poetic lecture. To advertise the event Mr. 
Carleton bought a large amount of wall-pa- 
per for a small amount of money, and in a 
paint-shop lettered gaudy posters which he 
tacked up in conspicuous places about town. 
A few people heard the lecture and declared 
it was so good that it must be repeated in 
a larger hall. A church was secured and a 
large audience was present. Several dollars 
above expenses were cleared, and in that and 
neighboring towns Carleton made enough 
money during his vacation, by delivering the 
lecture, to complete his College course. At 
the Commencement he read a poem entitled 
"Rifts in the Cloud." 



A PIONEER POET 



155 



At graduation he was practically penniless, 
and at a loss to know what to do for a living. 
He was too ambitious to go back to farming, 
and revolted at the idea of resuming his 
work as schoolmaster. His ambition was to 
become a recognized poet, and one day, by 
way of experiment, he sent a poem to a 
humble paper in Chicago. It pleased the 
editor, who offered him a position on his 
staff at twelve dollars a week. He accepted 
eagerly. A few months later he returned 
to Michigan, the editor of the Hillsdale 
"Standard" having offered him one-third 
of his income to take charge of the paper. 

It was while editing the "Standard " that 
Mr. Carleton brought out his first volume of 
poems, bearing all the expense himself, pub- 
lishers having refused it. A thousand copies 
were printed, most of which the poet ped- 
dled out among his friends. The book was 
favorably noticed by the press and gave 
the author some standing. Soon after that 
he began writing poems for the " Toledo 
Blade," receiving no compensation. The 
editor liked and published them, but none 
seemed to hit the public taste until " Betsy 
and I Are Out " was printed. It was cop- 




Skelch from an 

early portrait 

of Mr. Carleton. 



156 



A PIONEER POET 



ied everywhere, and finally the editor of 
" Harper's Weekly " asked Mr. Carleton to 
send him some verses. He wrote and sent 
" Over the Hills to the Poorhouse," for 
which he received thirty dollars, greatly to 
his surprise. It was the first poem for which 
he had received money. He continued to 
write for the " Weekly," and 
soon the Harpers published a 
volume of his works, " Farm 
Ballads. " " Farm Legends, ' ' 
" Farm Festivals," " City 
Ballads " and other volumes 
followed in rapid succession. 
In 1880 Mr. Carleton mar- 
ried and moved to Brooklyn, 
where he still lives. He 
writes much and spends a portion of each 
year lecturing and reading from his works. 
"The First Settler's Story" is Mr. Carle- 
ton's own favorite of all his poems. 

" Betsy and I Are Out " and " Over the 
Hills to the Poorhouse ' ' being, perhaps, the 
author's most celebrated productions, it is 
interesting to learn how they were inspired. 
In 187 1 Mr. Carleton was much impressed 
by the prevalence of divorces, and often 




A corner in Mr. Carletorfs 
library. 



"A PIONEER POET 157 

strayed into the court-room in Hillsdale to 
hear the testimony in various cases. He 
saw and heard there the domestic troubles of 
others, and they gave him the idea of the 
former poem. The characters in it repre- 
sent no one in particular, intended only to 
be typical of a class. Near Hillsdale was 
the County Poorhouse, between which and 
the town proper was a small hill. The poet 
often went to the almshouse to see and talk 
with the unfortunate inmates. He was par- 
ticularly touched by the case of an aged 
couple, husband and wife, who had been 
sent to the institution by their children. 
Their sad lot, of which, however, they did 
not complain, suggested the latter poem. 

Mr. Carleton's poetical works include 
"Farm Legends," "Farm Ballads," "Farm 
Festivals," "City Legends," "City Festi- 
vals," " Rhymes of Our Planet," etc. 

"The Lightning Rod Dispenser" and 
" The Christmas Baby " are selected for this 
book from " Farm Legends," with the per- 
mission of the author and publishers. All 
of Mr. Carleton's works are published by 
Harper Brothers, New York. 




r 




MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD 

Mrs. Mary Hartwell Catherwood was 
born in the little town of Luray, O., on the 
sixteenth day of December, 1847. She was 
the daughter of a country physician, who was 
descended from a line of Scotch-Irish bar- 
onets, the Scott family. He removed with 
his young family to Illinois long before the 
prairies were drained and cultivated. He fell 
a victim to the arduous duties of his profes- 
sion in that new and unsettled country, and 
died when his daughter was ten years of age. 
Her mother died a year later. 

Mary Hartwell was always given to story- 
making, and even at that early period of her 
life she knew well what she intended to do ; 
indeed, she cannot remember a time when 
she did not have a well formulated idea of 
what her great work in life would be. She 
was going to write stories. In fact, at that 
age she had already made notable childish 
excursions into the realms of literature. She 
grew up in the home of a relative, and in the 



1 62 MARY HART WELL CATHERWOOD 

female college at Granville, O., from which 
institution she was graduated in 1868. 

In 1877 Miss Hartwell became the wife of 
Mr. James S. Catherwood and most of her 
best literary work has been done since then. 
Her one notable production previous to that 
time was " A Woman in Armor," published 
in 1875. Mrs. Catherwood's first great lit- 
erary success was the production of " The 
Romance of Dollard." Three years before 
the novel appeared Mrs. Catherwood had 
a deep sorrow, and, for a change and diver- 
sion of mind, she went to spend a part of 
one summer in Canada with the family of a 
friend, who was the United States Consul at 
Sherbrooke. While there she made the his- 
tory of the old French regime a special 
study, and became deeply interested in the 
romances of the Provinces. She read the 
comprehensive historical compilations of 
Parkman, and from them she got the inspi- 
ration for her story. 

Three years later she took the completed 
"Romance of Dollard," in manuscript, to 
New York City. Her husband, with the 
true Western idea of business, urged her to 
do so, ' ' and I wanted to go, ' ' said Mrs. 



MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD 1 63 

Catherwood. She carried with her a letter 
from James Whitcomb Riley, who is a friend 
of her husband and herself, to the editor of 
"The Century," Mr. Richard Watson Gil- 
der. When she offered him the novel Mr. 
Gilder laughed, showed her the vast quanti- 
ties of accumulated manuscripts in the of- 
fice, and said : 

"You might as well expect to be struck 
by lightning as to have a long story ac- 
cepted here." 

Three or four days later, when the con- 
tract for its publication was made, Mr. Gil- 
der said : " The lightning has struck." 

Mrs. Catherwood's home is in Hoopeston, 
111., a small prairie city on a direct line 
between Chicago and Indianapolis. Here 
the writer lives a busy life, for, besides her 
literary work and her home to look after, she 
is actively identified with the affairs of the 
church of which she is a member. She has 
one child, a daughter. When asked if she 
had any fads or pets, Mrs. Catherwood re- 
plied : "I have no fads that I know of, but 
I have a few pets, and chief among them is 
my little daughter." 



164 MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD 




i '^i-^ 



Hearth in Mrs. Ca/h- 
erwood's home. 



Mrs. Catherwood frequently visits in Chi- 
cago, and on the occasion of one of these 
visits the accompanying sketch of her was 
made. She spends at least one day of each 
week in the city at work in the great and 
growing libraries. The Catherwood home 
in Hoopeston is a delightful place where the 
neighbors love to gather, and one of the 
most charming spots in it is the big hearth, 
about the open fire of which children especial- 
ly delight in congregating, to listen to the 
author's well-told tales. A few years ago Mrs. 
Catherwood spent many months in France 
making an exhaustive research for material for 
her latest work, a life of Joan d'Arc. Among 
her better known publications are : ' ' Craque- 
o'-Doom," "Rocky Fork," " Old Caravan 
Days," " The Secrets of Roseladies," " Old 
Kaskaskia," "The Romance of Dollard," 
" The Lady of Fort St. John," "The Spirit 
of an Illinois Town," "The Chase of St. 
Castin," "The Dogberry Ranch" and 
"The Story of Tonty." The selection in 
"Authors' Readings " is republished by per- 
mission of The Century Company, New 
York, and the author. 







J^S^a^C^^^M^-. 



"THE HOOSIER POET" 

James Whitcomb Riley, popularly known 
as the " Hoosier Poet," was born in Green- 
field, Ind., in 1854. Greenfield is a little, 
ragged village — half country, half town. Mr. 
Riley was brought up there, not living in 
direct daily contact with farmers, but just 
enough removed from them to have the 
rural dialect impress itself upon his mind. 
His poetic instinct manifested itself early. 
When he was little more than a baby he 
wrote his first verse — a four-line motto for a 
comic valentine he had drawn. 

Until recent years the poet cared little for 
books, especially school books, but he was 
always deep versed in Nature's lore and the 
secrets she imparts to those only whom she 
loves. He received only the merest rudi- 
ments of a common-school education, for he 
would not study, preferring to gaze long- 
ingly out of the window with thoughts of 
" green fields and running brooks." 



i68 



THE HOOSIER POET 




The 



old swimmin 

hole. 



To some extent Mr. Riley inherits his 
poetic ability. His father, Captain Reuben 
A. Riley, a lawyer, was something of a poet, 
many of his productions having been pub- 
lished in the local papers. An uncle, James 
Riley, also has a considerable fame as a verse 
writer. It was from Captain Lee O. Harris, 
his schoolmaster, however, that Mr. Riley 
got the training which has done 
most toward making him a great 
poet. Mr. Harris is a poet of 
merit and had written good verse 
before James Whitcomb Riley was 
born. He recognized the poetic 
ability of his lesson-hating pupil 
and a mutual admiration sprung 
up between them. They took 
long walks together through woods and fields 
and " up and down old Brandy wine." 

People who have heard Mr. Riley read 
will not be surprised to learn that at one 
time he thought seriously of becoming an 
actor. He had rare dramatic talent when a 
boy and took a leading part in all local ama- 
teur performances. When he was a mere 
youth he made a great " hit " in a perform- 



"THE HOOSIER POET " 169 

ance given for the purpose of raising funds 
to purchase a band-wagon for the Greenfield 
Brass Band, the same organization of which 
he long afterwards wrote : 

" And when the boys 'u'd saranade, I've laid so still 
in bed 
I've even heerd the locus'-blossoms droppin' on the 

shed 
When ' Lily Dale,' er ' Hazel Dell,' had sobbed 
and died away — 

. . I want to hear the old band play." 

Captain Harris wrote the play and made 
the leading role expressly to fit the talent of 
young Riley. The play was produced five 
nights, and more than enough money was 
cleared to purchase the band-wagon. 

Mr. Riley's father intended to make a 
lawyer out of him, but when the lad found 
that Political Economy and Blackstone did 
not rhyme he tired of law, and one day ran 
away from home with a travelling patent 
medicine aggregation. He travelled thus for 
a year, taking part in the evening wagon 
concerts. Then, being a clever painter, he 
went into the sign painting business with 
several other young men. For four years 



170 



" THE HOOSIER POET 




The boy Riley with 
his school-master , 
Lee O. Harris. 



they travelled over the State, painting adver- 
tisements on fences and barns on all roads 
leading into the towns. Each of the paint- 
ers was a musician, and they gave concerts 
in the evenings. One whistled beautifully, 
another sang, another played a banjo, and 
Riley scuffled with a violin and guitar and 

spoke verses written by himself. 
' fy,, •■ During his sign-painting career he 

sometimes posed as ' ' the celebrated 
blind sign-painter." Pretending to 
be stone blind, he bewildered the 
crowds which collected to watch 
him work. Mr. Riley was contin- 
ually playing practical jokes. Per- 
haps the most ludicrous was one he 
played on the Methodist Church 
congregation of his native town. 
The story as told the writer by a 
relative of the poet is this : The 
church needed repairing badly, and a com- 
mittee went about soliciting aid. Mr. Riley, 
who was handy at any kind of work, could 
not help in a financial way, but volunteered 
to repair the church clock. The committee 
consented. Just before the reopening of the 



THE HOOSIER POET 



171 






church he brought the clock back and care- 
fully hung it in its accustomed" place high 
on the wall over the pulpit. At eleven 
o'clock, when the minister was warming to 
his subject, the old clock began striking. It 
struck fifteen, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, 
sixty, and kept on striking. The minister 
stopped. The clock did not. It was far 
out of reach and no ladder was handy. The 
congregation had to be dis- 
missed. 

Mr. Riley's first published 
poems were written for the lo- 
cal paper, the ' ' Hancock Dem- 
ocrat." He stopped painting 
to go to work on the Anderson 
(Ind.) "Democrat," for which 
paper he wrote all the rhymes the editor 
would let him, and did general reporting. 
He made up poetic advertisements and 
enjoyed telling the news in rhyme. His 
wages were poor, and he longed for a wider 
field and better pay. He sent many poems 
to the magazines, but all were rejected. His 
friends told him that his verses were silly, 
and it was to vindicate his contention that 



rf- 



A sign painted by 
Mr. Riley. 



172 



" THE HOOSIER POET 




they were mistaken that he perpetrated a 
Poe-poem fraud which he has always deeply 
regretted. He studied the style of Edgar 
Allan Poe, and wrote an imitation poem 
which he entitled, " Leonainie," and had it 
published in the Kokomo (Ind.) " Gazette." 
It was made to appear that it was an un- 
published poem by Poe, found in an old 
book. It created a sensation, and many 
wise literary people declared it to be gen- 
uine. It soon became known that Mr. Riley 
had forged it ; he was involved in no end 
of trouble, he lost his position 
■-£,*/' on the "Democrat," but he had 
proved that he could write good 
poetry. Soon afterward he 
wrote a Christmas story for 
the Indianapolis " Journal," 
which pleased the editor, and 
he was invited to become a 
member of the paper's staff. 

He remained on the "Jour- 
nal" for years and for it wrote 
his first Hoosier dialect poems. 
They were signed " Benj. F. 
Johnson, of Boone." After a 



The Riley Homestead, 

showing attic ' ' where 

the boys slept." 1 



"THE HOOSIER POET 173 

sufficient number had been written they 
were collected and published in a volume 
entitled " The 01' Swimmin' Hole an' 
'Leven More Poems," which Mr. Riley 
published at his own expense. It sold well, 
and ever since he has been deriving a large 
and steadily increasing income from the 
products of his most prolific pen. For sev- 
eral years Mr. Riley read in public from 
his works and was one of the most successful 
author-readers in the country, but he never 
liked it and had a strong aversion to travel, 
so, early in 1896, he retired from the plat- 
form. He lives in Indianapolis. 

Following is a list of Mr. Riley's books 
and the popular poems they contain : 

"Neighborly Poems:" with thirty-six 
poems in Hoosier dialect, including The Old 
Swimmin' Hole, When the Frost Is on the 
Punkin, and Thoughts fer the Discuraged 
Farmer. 

"Sketches in Prose:" Twelve stories, 
each prefaced by a poem, including The 
Elf- Child and Old-Fashioned Roses. 

" Afterwhiles : " Sixty-two poems and 
sonnets, serious, pathetic, humorous and 



174 "THE HOOSIER POET ™ 

dialect, including A Life Lesson, Old Aunt 
Mary's, The Lost Kiss, The Beautiful City, 
The South Wind and the Sun, When Bessie 
Died, Knee Deep in June, A Liz-Town Hu- 
morist, Griggsby Station, No thin' to Say, 
etc. 

" Pipes o' Pan : " Five sketches and fifty 
poems, including An Old Sweetheart. This 
poem is also published separately in large 
table-book size, profusely illustrated. 

" Rhymes of Childhood : " One hundred 
and two dialect and serious poems. 

"Old-Fashioned Roses: " Sixty-one se- 
lected poems, published in England. 

■'The Flying Islands of the Night: " A 
weird and grotesque drama in verse. 

" Green Fields and Running Brooks: " 
One hundred and two poems and sonnets, 
dialect, humorous, and serious, containing A 
Dream of Autumn, On the Banks o' Deer 
Crick, A Country Pathway, Dot Leedle 
Boy, etc. 

" Armazindy : " Containing some of Mr. 
Riley's best dialect and serious work, includ- 
ing Armazindy and the famous Poe Poem. 

"Poems Here at Home:" Containing 
The Absence of Little Wesley, Down to the 



"THE HOOSIER POET " 1 75 

Capital, The Old Band, The Raggedy Man, 
Little Cousin Jasper, Bereaved, and the 
well-known The Old Man and Jim, etc. 

"A Child World" is the last of Mr. 
Riley's books. 

All of the above books, with the excep- 
tion of " Poems Here at Home," published 
by the Century Company, New York, and 
' ' Old - Fashioned Roses, ' ' by Longmans, 
Green, & Company, London, are published 
by The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indian- 
apolis and Kansas City, U. S. A. 



OP1E POPE READ 

When Opie Pope Read was asked, twelve 
years ago, to write his autobiography, he 
gave the following characteristic account of 
his life up to that time : 

" There are very few facts in connection 
with my life. I have been but a loitering 
gleaner in the harvest-field of fact. I was 
born in Nashville, Tenn. I am thirty-three 
years of age, and am reasonably honest and 
presumably religious. I began my down- 
ward course on the ' Patriot,' a small paper 
that hobbled on three legs in Franklin, Ky. 
The proprietors were much pleased with my 
work, for I pulled a hand-press with a strong 
arm, but they always seemed to pay me re- 
luctantly. In 1877 I edited the Bowling 
Green (Ky.) ' Pantograph,' and I have no 
cause to believe that anyone shed a tear 
when — by request — I resigned my position. 
In 1878 I took the position of city editor 
of the Little Rock (Ark.) ' Gazette,' and 



l8o OPIE POPE READ 

continued to write watered truth for that 
paper until 1881, when I accepted a posi- 
tion on the Cleveland (O.) ' Leader.' I did 
not remain long on the ' Leader. ' I had 
been engaged to do literary work, but Mr. 
Cowles, the editor, soon gave me instructions 
that fell heavily upon my ears. He wanted 
me to compile statistics — wanted a tabulated 
statement of the lives that had been lost on 
Lake Erie from the time of Perry's victory 
down to the dog-days of 1879. I under- 
took this work, but somehow it did not 
please him. He said that I had thrown un- 
wonted life into my figures, and that my de- 
ductions were endowed with unwarranted 
spirit. I seized a broom, swept my labor 
out of the Western Reserve, and returned to 
Arkansas. In June, 1882, Mr. P. D. Ben- 
ham and I began the publication of the 
' Arkansavv Traveller,' a paper which goes 
all over the country, and which at one time, 
we thought, would go to the deuce. ' ' 

Mr. Read moved the " Arkansaw Travel- 
ler " from Little Rock to Chicago in 1887. 
He has lived in Chicago ever since, writing 
profusely for literary syndicates and produc- 



OPIE POPE READ 



181 



ing several novels. He often reads selec- 
tions from his writings in public. He has 
the reputation of being the best story-teller in 
the Chicago Press Club, and spends much of 
his time at the club-house keeping up that 
reputation. He has no regard for facts, but 
has a natural dramatic gift. He is about six 
feet and four inches tall, has broad shoulders 
and a leonine front. 

Opie Read had many hard struggles when a 
young man, which he does 
not mention in his auto- 
biography. At one time 
he and a partner published 
the "Prairie Flower," at 
Carlyle, Kan. It did not 
pay. The partners were 
finally requested to leave 

account of their inability to pay their bills. ^% 
Having no place to sleep, they made good 
use of their annual editorial railway passes. 
Boarding a train that went through Carlyle Opie Read telling 
in the evening, they curled up on the seats of stortes m the 

° . Chicago 

a warm car and slept, transferring to a train Press 

that would bring them back to their town Club. 

early the next morning. Thus one cold 




182 OPIE POPE READ 

winter is said to have worn away. After an 
unsuccessful early newspaper venture in 
Nashville, Tenn., Mr. Read began a long 
tramp overland, covering, it is estimated, 
nearly four hundred miles. The hardships 
he endured during that forced tramp fur- 
nished him with a fund of ideas for his later 
literary work. 

Among his more important books are : 
"A Kentucky Colonel," " Emmett Bon- 
lore," "A Tennessee Judge," " On the Su- 
wanee River," and " The Jucklins. " 

The story "A Backwoods Sunday" is 
reprinted in "Authors' Readings," from an 
early book of short stories, with permission 
from the author. 



"THE POET OF PASSION" 

Mrs. Ella Wheeler Wilcox was born 
in Johnstown Centre, Wis. Her parents 
were emigrants from Vermont to Wisconsin 
in the early days of that State. Her father, 
who was a descendant from Ethan Allen, was 
in his younger days a teacher of the violin. 
In Wisconsin he became a farmer, and it was 
upon a farm that the first years of Mrs. 
Wilcox were spent. Soon after she was 
born the family moved to a farm in the town 
of Westport, Wis., a few miles from Madi- 
son, in the famous " four-lakes district." It 
was amid the rural scenes of this most beau- 
tiful country that she caught the first inspira- 
tion of poetry. 

Her early education was somewhat limited. 
She attended the public school in the village 
of Windsor. Having a decided tendency 
toward story-writing and rhyming she was 
always called upon to furnish the fiction and 
verse for the school magazine. She seems 



i86 



THE POET OF PASSION 



to have written verses from the time she first 
learned to spell. She was but a little more 
than eight years of age when she wrote, or, 
rather, printed, a most ingenious novel, the 
original manuscript of which she still has in 
her possession. The early tendency of the 
poet to write of love and passion is shown 
by it, for innumerable love-affairs, always 
culminating in weddings, are scattered 
throughout the little volume. The hero be- 
comes a Justice of the Peace, which the 
youthful country author looked upon as the 
highest earthly position of honor. The title 
page reads : 

" Minnie Tighthand and Mrs. Dunley, an 
Eloquent Novel Written by Miss Ella 
Wheeler. ' ' 

There is a preface reading as follows : 
" The following novel is a true story. I 
suppose the reader 
will doubt it, but 
it is true. It is a 




Ella Wheeler Wilcox's Bungalow at 
Short Beach, Conn. 



" THE POET OF PASSION " 1 87 

scene that I witnessed when living in Eng- 
land, and after I came to America I pub- 
lished it. The reader may believe it now." 
At that time the girl had never been 
twenty-five miles away from home, and Mrs. 
Wilcox wonders now how she ever con- 
ceived such a deception. Nearly every 
chapter of the novel is begun with an origi- 
nal verse. The following is a sample : 

' ' A head covered with pretty curls, 
Face white as the snow. 
Her teeth look like handsome pearls, 
She's tall and merry to ! " 

Mrs. Wilcox was then, as she has always 
been since, an indefatigable worker, often 
producing several short poems in one day. 
She had a great desire to see some of her 
productions in print, and set about, without 
her parents' knowledge, to have them pub- 
lished. Finally, at the age of fourteen, one 
of her articles was published in the New 
York "Mercury." The delighted girl sent 
for a large number of the issue containing it, 
and the arrival of the bundle was the first in- 
timation her parents had that their child 



l88 "THE POET OF PASSION" 

had "gone into print." When she was 
sixteen years old "The Chimney Corner" 
printed one of her productions and paid her 
for it. It was the first money she had ever 
earned. Soon after she became a paid con- 
tributor to "Harper's Bazar," "Harper's 
Weekly," "The Saturday Evening Post," 
of Philadelphia, Leslie's periodicals and 
many other publications. 

The refusal of her works by editors never 
discouraged her. As soon as a poem or arti- 
cle was returned by one she sent it to an- 
other. She had an elaborate system of book- 
keeping, keeping scores of productions in the 
mails all the time. She was particularly 
anxious to have an article published in the 
" Atlantic Monthly," and placed that maga- 
zine at the top of her list. Finally, after 
five years of disappointment, she had a poem 
accepted, and waited three years before see- 
ing it published. Then she got five dollars 
for it. But it was not many years till she 
found a ready market for all she produced. 
Besides her collections of poems she has pub- 
lished several novels and has written much 
for the newspaper syndicates. Her first 



"the poet of passion*" I«9 

volume, "Drops of Water," was published 
in 1872, and is a collection of verses on the 
subject of total abstinence. 

"Solitude," which is, perhaps, her most 
famous poem, was inspired one day when 
the poet, then a young lady, was on her 
way from her Westport home to Madison, to 
attend a public reception at the Wisconsin 
Gubernatorial mansion. On the train she 
met a friend, a woman in widow's weeds, 
who had recently been bereaved. She was 
deeply touched by the look of sorrow in her 
face, and, while preparing for the reception 
that evening, the first two lines of the poem, 

" Laugh, and the world laughs with you, 
Weep, and you weep alone," 

flashed into her mind. Two more lines, 

' ' For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth 
But has trouble enough of its own," 

sung themselves into her brain while driving 
to the Governor's residence. She completed 
the poem the following morning. 

In 1884 Miss Wheeler was married to Mr. 
Robert M. Wilcox, and her home since then 




I90 " THE POET OF PASSION " 

has been in the East. She lives in New 
York City in the winter, and in her sum- 
mer home at Short Beach, Conn., during 
the hot months. She has given her seaside 
cottage a poetic name — " The Bungalow." 
The poet of passion has many fads, chief 
among them being her gowns, which she de- 
signs herself. She has an elaborate and 
costly collection of girdles, and is always 
on the lookout for unique and handsome ones 
to add to it. Her fad in animals is fine Per- 
sian cats, which she trains to perform. 

Among Ella Wheeler Wilcox's better 
known books are " Maurine, and Other 
Poems," which was first published in 1875, 
' ' Poems of Passion, " " Poems of Pleasure, ' ' 
''Mai Moulee," a novel, "Men, Women, 
and Emotions " and " Custer and Other 
Poems." The three poems, " Solitude " 
and •" The Beautiful Land of Nod," from 
" Poems of Passion," and " Which Are 
You ? " from "Custer and Other Poems," 
all copyrighted, are reproduced in " Au- 
thors' Readings ' ' by permission from 
both the author and the publishers, W. 
B. Conkey Company, Chicago. 



Ella Wheeler Wilcox's 
trained cat. 




ULL-^L^ yw a_^-*wt ik fan. fcKJL *-*- 



CHARLES B. LEWIS 

M. Quad, whose real name is Charles B. 
Lewis, was born on the fifteenth day of Feb- 
ruary, 1844, in the little town of Liverpool, O. 
Where he was born and where he spent his 
childhood are of minor consequence, how- 
ever, since his career did not begin until he 
was blown up twenty-eight years ago on a 
racing Ohio River steamboat. He is, per- 
haps, the solitary example of a man being 
lifted into fame by a boiler explosion. 

The accident happened in the spring of 
1869. Mr. Lewis, who had served through 
the Civil War, and fought Indians for two 
years with General Custer, had received a 
letter from the editor of the Mayville (Ky.) 
"Bulletin," asking him to come and work 
on his paper. Like several other American 
humorists, Mr. Lewis had learned the print- 
er's trade at an early age. He started from 
Lansing, Mich., where he was engaged as a 
compositor, press-hand, local reporter and 



194 CHARLES B. LEWIS 

general man about a small newspaper office. 
He went by way of Detroit and took the 
steamer from Cincinnati. A strange thing- 
happened which the humorist has never been 
able to account for. His mind became a to- 
tal blank from the time he left Detroit. It 
transpired later that while he was in Cincin- 
nati he wrote and posted a letter to his wife, 
but he did not know that he had done so. 
He has not the slightest remembrance of 
having boarded the steamer. Neither does 
he remember anything about the explosion, 
but there certainly was one — a terrific one, 
too — and Mr. Lewis, when picked up from 
the shore, terribly scalded and bruised, was 
thought to be dead. He was taken to a 
hospital and there, sixteen days from the time 
he left Detroit, he regained consciousness. 

He went back to Michigan and resumed 
his work of setting type on the Pontiac 
" Jacksonian." One day the office ran 
short of " miscellaneous " matter, and Mr. 
Lewis, without copy, set up from his case 
the story of his Ohio River experience, de- 
scribing his sensations while "progressing 
sideways through the air," as he put it. 



CHARLES B. LEWIS 



195 



The article was headed " How It Feels to 
Be Blown Up," and was signed M. Quad. 
When asked recently why he selected that 
nom de plume Mr. Lewis said : 

" Oh, it was the first thing that popped 
into my brain. It was natural for me, being 
a compositor, to use such a name. An em 
quad, you know, is the metal space a 
printer puts between the period and 
the first letter of the following word. 
I might just as well have signed myself 
Italics, Roman, Small Caps, or any 
other printer's term, but M. Quad struck 
me first and has stuck by me ever since." 

That article was so filled with genuine 
humor that it was copied far and wide. It 
attracted the attention of the editor of the 
Detroit ' ' Free Press, ' ' at that time a paper 
of none but local fame, who soon engaged 
the compositor as a reporter. His connec- 
tion with the " Free Press " lasted twenty- 
two years, and during that time he wrote 
the greater part of the many humorous 
and pathetic stories which gave that paper 
a great circulation in this and other coun- 
tries. He went to New York in i8qi to 




Mr. Lewis 

setting up his 

first humorous 

article. 



196 



CHARLES B. LEWIS 




M. Quad among 
the sailors. 



enter a broader field for observation and 
literary labor. He has worked almost con- 
tinuously ever since for the literary syndi- 
cates, producing an astounding amount of 
matter. He lives in Brooklyn. 

M. Quad's greatest horror has always been 
that readers would tire of his types. That 
accounts for the succession of unique and 
totally dissimilar characters which he has cre- 
ated. When he had the "Lime 
Kiln Club" at the height of its 
popularity he dropped it to delve 
in a fresh field. "His Honor," 
"Bijah," "Brother Gardner," 
"Trustee Pullback," "Mr. and 
Mrs. Bowser," "Carl Dunder," 
and many more of his creations 
are as real to millions of readers as 
any characters in history. With 
the possible exception of the " Arizona Kick- 
er," there is not a trace of ill-nature in all of 
his writings. Governor Irwin, of Arizona, 
once said that half the readers of the so-called 
" extracts from the ' Kicker ' " believe them 
to be real, and that they have injured the 
country more than the wild Indians have. 
M. Quad is as eccentric as he is humorous. 



CHARLES B. LEWIS 197 

His personal appearance, his manner, even 
the tones of his voice, are peculiar. He is a 
man of fads and hobbies, having tried and 
tired of innumerable things seemingly ridicu- 
lous for a plodding journalist. During recent 
years his chief delight has been to do a sort 
of literary missionary work among sailors. 
Nearly every pleasant day, once a week at 
least, he may be seen about the wharves of 
New York Harbor, carrying on his arm a 
basket filled with books of fiction, which he 
distributes free among the sailors. He has 
made a careful study of the subject and says 
that of all stories the sailors enjoy most the 
sea-tales of W. Clark Russell. Mr. Lewis 
spends much of his time studying human 
nature in the slums of the great East Side of 
New York City, and makes frequent trips to 
Thompson Street to get inspiration for his 
negro stories. He likes to talk with the col- 
ored people about hoodoos. Another of his 
delights is to get on a street-car and ride 
until he gets tired, without paying the slight- 
est attention to where the car is taking him. 
M. Quad's four published books are : "Quad's 
Odds," "Sawed-Off Sketches," "The Lime 
Kiln Club," and "Field, Fort, and Fleet." 



* " THE WIT OF LARAMIE " 

The little town of Shirley, Me., was the 
birthplace of Edgar William Nye. He was 
born on the twenty-fifth day of August, 1850, 
but did not live long in Maine. ' ' When 
only two years of age," he wrote in his au- 
tobiography, " I girded up my loins, and 
without other luggage, travelled westerly, 
taking with me my parents, who pleaded so 
hard to go that I could not well refuse 
them." 

The family went to Northern Wisconsin, 
where, on a farm on the banks of the St. 
Croix River, Mr. Nye grew to manhood. 
Speaking of his childhood, he said : " There 
is nothing in particular, perhaps, to distin- 
guish my youth from that of other eminent 
men. I did not study Greek grammar by 
the light of a pine-knot when I was a child. 
I did not think about it." 

Mr. Nye received an academic education 
at River Falls, Wis., and studied law in that 



' ' THE WIT OF LARAMIE 



city. He did not, however, apply for ad- 
mission to the bar. He Avent to Wyoming 
Territory in 1876, where he was admitted 
to the bar and practiced law for several 
years in Laramie City, but, according to his 
account he managed to keep the matter very 
quiet, so that only a few people ever knew 
much about it. He was elected to the office 
of Justice of the Peace. Having much time 
at his disposal and possessing a "consider- 
able assortment of long words, which he had 
thought out at leisure moments," he began 
writing Sunday letters for the Cheyenne 
" Sun " at a dollar a column. Thus began 
his career as a humorous writer. 

" My revenue from those letters," he said, 
" which aggregated as much as sixty dollars 
a year, so completely dwarfed 
the returns from my law prac- 
tice that I aban- 
tMfr- doned the latter." 







Bill Nye s home at Ashcvllle, A/. C. 



" THE WIT OF LARAMIE " 203 

He soon accepted a position on the Lar- 
amie City "Sentinel." Of the editor of 
that paper he wrote later : ' ' He was 
warm-hearted and generous to a fault. He 
was more generous to a fault than to any- 
thing else — more especially his own faults. 
He gave me twelve dollars a week to edit 
the paper — local, telegraph, selections, 
religious, sporting, political, fashions, and 
obituary. He said twelve dollars was too 
much, but if I would jerk the press oc- 
casionally and take care of his children he 
would try to stand it." 

Mr. Nye left the " Sentinel" to found a 
paper which he named the " Boomerang," 
after his favorite mule, which he called Boom- 
erang, because he never knew where it would 
strike. The office was over a livery stable in 
which the mule was kept, and on the door 
Nye put this sign : " Persons wishing to see 
the editor will please twist the tail of the 
white mule and take the elevator. ' ' From that 
time Bill Nye's fame dates. The "Boomer- 
ang ' ' was quoted all over the country and 
abroad, but it was not a financial success. 
Mr. Nye was one of the prominent citizens 



204 



THE WIT OF LARAMIE " 



of Laramie City, and after serving his term 
as Justice of the Peace, held the offices of 
United States Commissioner, Superintendent 
of Public Schools, and Member of the City 
Council. 

He was subsequently Postmaster, also, and 
his humorous letter of acceptance, written to 
the President, was given out for publication 
in Washington, and was laughed over through- 
out the country. He gave it as his opinion 
that his selection for the office was a triumph 
of eternal right over error and wrong. Con- 
tinuing, he said : " It is one of the epochs, 
I may say, in the nation's onward march 
How Bill Nye toward political purity and perfection. I 
don't know when I have noticed any stride 
in affairs of State which has so thoroughly 
impressed me with its wisdom." He resigned 
before his term of office expired and his 
letter of resignation to the President was 
equally humorous and was likewise given 
out for publication. He told the President 
that he had left the key to the office in the 
wood-shed, and that the read postal cards 
had been carefully pigeon-holed separately 
from the unread ones. Bill Nye in those 




once looked. 



"THE WIT OF LARAMIE" 205 

days wore a full beard and did not much 
resemble Bill Nye as die public remembers 
him. He was six feet tall, and during most 
of his life was very slender, but in the last 
few years before his death he became quite 
portly. 

After abandoning the "Boomerang" he 
removed to Hudson, Wis., where he lived 
for a number of years and broadened his 
field by contributing to the Chicago " Daily 
News," "Puck" and other papers, and col- 
lecting and publishing in book form the 
better articles he had written for the 
' ' Boomerang. ' ' His first book was ' ' Forty 
Lies and Other Liars." Like Eugene Field 
and James Whitcomb Riley, he had a knack 
for sketching, and sometimes illustrated, in a 
crude way, his own works. 

The popularity of Mr. Nye's writings 
grew rapidly and his services were accord- 
ingly much sought after. The New York 
"World" secured them in 1886, and he 
wrote a weekly article for that paper until a 
few months before his death. This article 
was syndicated also and published in several 
hundreds of newspapers throughout the 



206 



■'THE WIT OF LARAMIE' 1 




A pen drawing 

of Mr. Nye 
and his son 
by himself. 



United States. The returns from the sales 
of these articles, from his books, and from 
his annual lecture tours made him a wealthy- 
man. In his lectures the effect of his odd 
and original remarks was much heightened 
by his droll manner. He had no subject. 
When asked by lecture committees what he 
was going to talk about he telegraphed back 
that "he would talk about an hour." One 
night in Chicago as he stepped out to the 
foot-lights, he said : "I have been prevailed 
upon to change the program to-night. I 
have given the same program in Chicago 
so many times that people have grown tired 
of it, so this evening we have decided upon 
a complete change. If you will look at your 
programs you will notice that they are 
pink. Last year they were blue." 

Mr. Nye had three homes, the old one at 
Hudson, Wis. ; one on Staten Island, N. Y. ; 
and another, a grand one, near Asheville, 
N. C. In the last he died on the twenty- 
second day of February, 1896. He left a 
wife and four children. 

A genial, gentle-mannered man was Bill 
Nye. Only once has the writer heard of his 



; 'THE WIT Ox' LARAMIE' 



207 



temper being ruffled. He was lecturing 
with James Whitcomb Riley in the South. 
They were both tired and not at all in a 
pleasant humor when they entered the lead- 
ing hotel in a small town. An officious 
clerk did not notice them as they came in, 
did not see that their baggage was taken or 
invite them to register. He was too busy 
talking politics. He had reached the climax 
of an oratorical outburst when Bill 
Nye, who had stood it as long as he 
could, said, in his droll way : " Say, 
do you know that you remind me 
of Clay ? " " Clay, ' ' exclaimed the 
flattered clerk as he turned around, 
1 ' the great Henry Clay ? " " No, " 
replied the humorist; "clay, just 
common clay. The kind they make 
sewer-pipe of." 

Mr. Nye was once caught in a terrific 
cyclone in which he had a leg broken and 
was otherwise seriously injured. In writing 
to a friend about the accident, he said : "I 
cannot for the life of me tell how it happened, 
but I think I must have slipped on a peel of 
thunder. People can't be too careful how 
they peel their thunder and leave it lying 
around on the sidewalk. ' ' 




You remind me 
of Clay. 



2o8 " THE WIT OF LARAMIE " 

The accompanying full-page drawing of 
Mr. Nye is from a sketch made from life in 
Chicago. The inscription " Made by Art 
Young in an unguarded moment and ap- 
proved this date by me," is characteristic 
of the man. The selections, " How to 
Hunt the Fox" and "A Blasted Snore," 
are taken, with permission from both author 
and publisher, from ' ' Wit and Humor, ' ' by 
Bill Nye and James Whitcomb Riley. The 
book is copyrighted and published by F. 
Tennyson Neely, New York City. 

Mr. Nye's other published works are : 
" A Comic History of the United States," 
"A Comic History of England," and "A 
Guest at the Ludlow." 




THE " VERITIST " 

Hamlin Garland, like his works, is of 
the Western farm. He is one of the farmers, 
and is proud of it. He was born in Septem- 
ber, i860, on a farm near the little village 
of West Salem, Wis. It was in a picturesque 
valley, or coule, which Mr. Gar- 
land speaks of now as the 
"home" coule. His boyhood 
experience was the hard one ot 
the ordinary poor farmer's son. 
When he was ten years of age i„ the home couis. 
the family moved to Osage, 
Iowa, on to a farm with which the author's 
most vivid recollections are associated. 
Eleven years later his father went to Dakota, 
leaving him alone on the Iowa farm to work 
it. He did all of the work alone that sea- 
son. Help was scarce. Even at that annual 
farm crisis, "harvest time," no man could 
be found to help him. The grain was un- 
usually heavy, and a great amount of it had 



212 THE " VERITIST 

been grown. Young Garland harvested 
every stalk of it, cutting all day long, bind- 
ing and stacking it by moon and star light. 
The hardships of the farmer were thoroughly 
impressed upon him. 

During the years he lived on the Iowa 
farm, he had managed to complete a course 
of study in the Cedar Valley Seminary, and 
his brain had been fired with a longing for 
greater knowledge and travel. The father 
was willing, and gave him thirty dollars for 
his season's labor. It was all Hamlin 
asked for. With that amount of money he 
started out into the world. He went to 
Chicago, but the size of the city frightened 
him, and he made his way gradually to Bos- 
ton. In Boston he made a poor living as 
a tutor of private classes, and he added to 
his fund of information by reading in the 
Public Library. A little later he worked his 
way back to the West, taught school in Illi- 
nois a few months, and then went to Da- 
kota to plunge into the midst of the memor- 
able land boom of 1883. He established 
himself on a " claim," which he subse- 
quently sold for two hundred dollars, and 



THE " VERITIST 213 

started back to Boston to pursue his teach- 
ing and reading. 

At that time he had no idea of becoming 
a writer of stories, and as to becoming a 
novelist, that was not even one of his ambi- 
tions. But in 1884 he wrote a homely 
sketch about corn-husking, describing it just 
as he had seen it and done it hundreds of 
times on the farm. He sent it to the " Lit- 
erary World," a New York publication. It 
was published, and the editor 
wrote an encouraging letter 
asking for more farm sketches 
written in the same style. He 
even promised to pay for them. 
That promise is all Mr. Garland 

, r ^ .. , , , Mr. Garland's 

ever got for the articles, but „.. , 

Wisconsin home. 

they opened the way to fame. 
He wrote a series of sketches to follow that on 
corn-husking, on various topics, harvesting, 
threshing, etc. Soon he branched out by 
sending a long poem to "Harper's Weekly." 
It was published, and the author was paid 
twenty dollars for it. It was then, Mr. Gar- 
land says, that he first realized that his lit- 
erary efforts really had a commercial value. 




214 



VERITIST 




Mr. Garland at work in 
his vineyard. 



He immediately set to work earnestly, and 
between 1884 and 1887 produced a pro- 
digious amount of sketches and short stories. 
They were in demand and he prospered. 

In 1887 he returned to the old farm in 
Iowa for a visit, and while there he first 
conceived the idea of writing a novel. As 
he watched the doings of the farm-folk 
about him, as he learned of 
the ups and downs of his for- 
mer neighbors, of the wander- 
ings of his boyhood play- 
mates, he realized that there 
is true romance in the lives 
of the plain Western farmers. 
He felt that he could write of 
them just as they were. No 
author ever had more faith in 
himself than Hamlin Garland. He had found 
the field in which he believed that he was 
born to work. It was a field of great richness, 
and one as yet almost wholly untilled. He 
returned to Boston and wrote his first novel. 
Others followed, and since then he has been 
kept busy producing its successors and writ- 
ing for magazines. 



THE " VERITIST " 215 

Mr. Garland has lived wherever he could 
work most advantageously, sometimes in 
New York, sometimes in Boston, sometimes 
in Chicago, and sometimes among the Rocky 
Mountains, but there is but one place he calls 
home. That is West Salem, Wis., in sight 
of the little farm in the "home" coule. 
There he has built a plain house on a few 
acres of land, and has established his aged 
parents in it. He spends a large part of each 
summer with them, taking great pride in his 
garden, working out of doors each afternoon. 
He is especially fond of his vineyard, and 
takes first prize for grapes at the County fair 
nearly every year. 

His published works are : " Main Trav- 
elled Roads," with an introduction by W. D. 
Howells, " A Member of the Third House," 
"A Spoil of Office," "Prairie Folks," 
"Rose of Deutscher's Coolly," "Prairie 
Songs," a book of poetry, and a book of 
essays on art called " Crumbling Idols." 

The story, [' Uncle Ethan Ripley," is se- 
lected by permission from " Prairie Folks," 
published in 1892 by F.J. Schulte, Chicago, 
and later by Stone & Kimball, New York. 



James Whitcomb Riley's 
Works, 

A Child-World. 

Neighborly Poems. 

Sketches in Prose. 

Afterwhiles. 

Pipes o' Pan. 

Rhymes of Childhood, 

The Flying Islands of the Night. 

Green Fields and Running Brooks. 

Armazindy. 

Old Fashioned Roses. 

An Old Sweetheart of Mine. 

The 

Bowen-Merrill Company, 

Publishers, 

INDIANAPOLIS. KANSAS CITY. 



Works by American 
Poets. 

Between Times. Learned. 
Cap and Bells. Peck. 
In the Name of the King. Klingle. 
Make Thy Way Mine. Klingle. 
Madrigals and Catches. Sherman. 
Old and New World Lyrics. Scollard. 
Point Lace and Diamonds. Baker. 
Quilting Bee, The. Heaton. 
Rhymes and Roses. Peck. 
Rings and Love Knots. Peck. 
Sylvan Lyrics. Hayne. 



Frederick A, Stokes Company, 
Publishers, 

NEW YORK. LONDON. 



an 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




017 1969980 • 






